Official Report: search what was said in Parliament
The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.
The Official Report search offers lots of different ways to find the information you’re looking for. The search is used as a professional tool by researchers and third-party organisations. It is also used by members of the public who may have less parliamentary awareness. This means it needs to provide the ability to run complex searches, and the ability to browse reports or perform a simple keyword search.
Searching by different views
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
- Report: this is the whole Official Report for a particular meeting of a committee or Parliament
- Item of business: this is each individual agenda item in an Official Report. For example, Portfolio Questions would be the item of business in a Meeting of the Parliament report
- Contribution: this is each time someone has made a spoken contribution to a meeting.
Depending on the kind of search you want to do, one of these views will be the best option. The default view is to show the report for each meeting of Parliament or a committee. For a simple keyword search, the results will be shown by item of business.
Search by MSP
When you choose to search by a particular MSP, the results returned will show each spoken contribution in Parliament or a committee, ordered by date with the most recent contributions first. This will usually return a lot of results, but you can refine your search by keyword, date and/or by meeting (committee or Chamber business).
We’ve chosen to display the entirety of each MSP’s contribution in the search results. This is intended to reduce the number of times that users need to click into an actual report to get the information that they’re looking for, but in some cases it can lead to very short contributions (“Yes.”) or very long ones (Ministerial statements, for example.) We’ll keep this under review and get feedback from users on whether this approach best meets their needs.
Searching by keyword
There are two types of keyword search:
- A keyword search without quotation marks will look for every instance of each word used and rank the results by frequency and proximity. It will also include variants of the keywords using “porter stemming”. This is when the search looks for the “stem” of a word regardless of its ending. So, for example, a search for [salmon farm] will return each instance of “salmon” and each instance of “farm” as well as potentially including results for “farms”, “farmed” and “farming”.
- A keyword search with quotation marks will only return instances of that exact phrase used. So, for example, a search for “salmon farm” in quotation marks will only return instances of that exact phrase.
Combining search filters
If you select an MSP’s name from the dropdown menu, and add a phrase in quotation marks to the keyword field, then the search will return only examples of when the MSP said those exact words. You can further refine this search by adding a date range or selecting a particular committee or Meeting of the Parliament.
More complex keyword searches
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
- a search for “salmon farm” AND “Loch Lomond” will return only results which include both exact phrases
- a search for “salmon farm” NOT “Loch Lomond” will return results for “salmon farm” but exclude results which also include “Loch Lomond”
- a search for “salmon farm” OR “Loch Lomond” will return all results for “salmon farm” and all results for “Loch Lomond” regardless of whether they appear together
Searching by date
There are two ways of searching by date.
You can either use the Start date and End date options to run a search across a particular date range. For example, you may know that a particular subject was discussed at some point in the last few weeks and choose a date range to reflect that.
Alternatively, you can use one of the pre-defined date ranges under “Select a time period”. These are:
- Current session (all Official Reports since the current sessions started)
- Last 6 months
- Last 12 months
- each of the previous sessions of Parliament. (Selecting the information icon above the “Select a time period” menu will give you the exact dates for each session.)
- All sessions
- You can also choose to select a custom date range, although adding a Start or End date will mean the search automatically defaults to this option.
If you search by an individual session, the list of MSPs and committees will automatically update to show only the MSPs and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of MSPs and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of MSPs and committees will update to show the information that was current at that time.
All Official Reports of meetings in the Debating Chamber of the Scottish Parliament.
All Official Reports of public meetings of committees.
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Displaying 2121 contributions
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Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Mairi Gougeon
They are being sold only as defrosted. More birds could potentially be frozen—that could be an option—but we have taken the decision and gone ahead with it because retailers cannot stock more frozen products. They are already selling birds as defrosted, if that makes sense.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Mairi Gougeon
On enforcement, we can see what has happened across the rest of GB. Local authorities have been asked not to enforce the regulations as they are, whereas, in Scotland, we have changed the legislation. We would simply be enforcing in the normal way.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Mairi Gougeon
We are not looking to do that at the moment. We intend the approach to be for only the stated period of time, given the nature of the outbreaks that we have seen.
To put things in context, at this time last year, we had not seen any cases. The circumstances are therefore very particular. We will, of course, potentially consider the matter again in the future, but, given the urgency of the situation and to prevent market disturbance, we have set out the approach for that period of time.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Mairi Gougeon
Absolutely. Obviously, the regulations will be in place for only a short period of time. Ultimately, we have to make decisions that are in the best interests of the industry and producers in Scotland. That is why we have introduced the regulations. The approach is in line with what is happening across Great Britain at the moment.
As far as I am aware, you are right: the EU is not introducing similar regulations. However, we know that AI impacts not only Scotland and the United Kingdom; it impacts other countries, too. I believe that there were trade reasons why defrosted meat was not permitted to be sold in that way. I do not know whether the officials have any other information on why we have set that out in regulations.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Common Frameworks
Meeting date: 2 November 2022
Mairi Gougeon
We reiterated those concerns right through the passage of that legislation. It is frustrating that none of those concerns were ever addressed and that the bill was not amended in a way that would have resolved them. I know that officials are working together on the guidance and the act’s practical implications, and I understand that those conversations are on-going, but it is, as I have previously outlined to the committee, one of our biggest concerns.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Common Frameworks
Meeting date: 2 November 2022
Mairi Gougeon
That is set out in some of the frameworks, which recognise how that could be dealt with and which also set out the trade-specific engagement fora that there are. Again, it might be helpful to have an illustrative example. We have been through the process with some free trade agreements. I will hand over to George Burgess, who can give a bit more detail of that.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Common Frameworks
Meeting date: 2 November 2022
Mairi Gougeon
Euan Page would like to come in on that.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Common Frameworks
Meeting date: 2 November 2022
Mairi Gougeon
The role of ESS is to assess compliance with environmental law. The frameworks, in and of themselves, do not alter that or the role of public bodies that would be engaged in doing that. If any legislative changes were due to be made, I imagine that ESS would have an interest in that, but I do not know how much of a role ESS would be expected to have in relation to the frameworks or what input it would be expected to have.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Common Frameworks
Meeting date: 2 November 2022
Mairi Gougeon
I have mentioned previously how we inform the committees of work that is undertaken in the interministerial group. For example, we have the communiqués, and we also send over a note of some of the items that have been discussed.
The exclusions process, in particular, would involve the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee. Parliament is notified at the point at which the secondary legislation goes through. That is the only example that I have. I do not know whether my officials have any information about whether there is any earlier engagement than that with the committee.
Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee
Common Frameworks
Meeting date: 2 November 2022
Mairi Gougeon
The Parliament’s role in monitoring and reviewing frameworks is an important part of the process. The various Governments in the UK have been discussing what that might look like. Again, I am keen to hear from committee members what such scrutiny can or should look like. If members think that the process can be improved upon in ways beyond those currently set out in the frameworks, I am open to consideration of those.
Euan Page might want to come in on that.
