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 1173 contributions
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Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
I have had a look on ALISS myself, and I cannae find any mention of men’s sheds in Dumfries and Galloway. I know that we have them from Stranraer to Lockerbie, so there is an issue about the system being at its most up to date and accurate.
What steps can be taken to support general practices in providing effective signposting? That might involve care navigators or other methods, but what is the best way of communicating to people what is out there?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
We have seen how the pandemic has made people engage more in daily walks and in accessing the outdoors. Has there been a shift in knowledge about social prescribing because of the pandemic? We know that people have been really isolated and that telephone befriending services were therefore set up. That would be seen as social prescribing that is not about sport but about tackling isolation to support wellbeing. Has the pandemic led to an increase in awareness of social prescribing?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
Thanks, convener. There was a bit of a mix of views. Some people had an absolutely excellent experience of accessing alternative pathways and for others it was the complete opposite. A lot of the challenges were about communication, how signposting is delivered and what pathways or social prescribing options are out there.
All those people defined what social prescribing meant, but it was very new to them and when they called the GP practice the receptionist could be the absolute barrier to any progress. Those were a couple of the issues that came up.
People also asked why they could not make online appointments and why they could not just get text messages to remind them when there was an appointment. They raised the issue of joined-up computer information data systems, as well.
Some of the points are the same as those that we heard in the social prescribing session that we had in the previous parliamentary session, so it will be interesting to hear everybody else’s thoughts this morning.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
My final question is about community links workers. When I last looked at the data, in March 2021, 218 links workers had been registered or looked at on the Scottish Government’s website, and it looks as though we are on track to have around 323 by March this year. Community links workers are supposed to help to direct people to the alternative pathways, services and social prescribing that are out there. How can links workers’ communication on the alternative pathways and social prescribing that are available for people help to support them?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
Good morning, panel. Some of the information that I was looking for has been covered by Dr Chris Williams, who talked about the benefits of ALISS.
Our briefing papers say that Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s “Care Navigation in General Practice: 10-Step Guide” recommends that individual practices collate and maintain their own lists of local service providers. GPs know their own locations, but is it realistic to expect them to collate and maintain their own databases, when programmes such as ALISS are out there? There are also regional programmes. For example, in Dumfries and Galloway, DG Locator is accessible and has an app. How do you feel about Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s recommendation that GPs keep their own database of places for social prescribing?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
The inquiry is about alternative pathways to primary care. In the previous parliamentary session, the Health and Sport Committee held an inquiry about social prescribing for physical activity and sport. I am not saying that everybody needs to take up cycling and running, but we know that access to the outdoors can be beneficial, that men’s sheds can support people and that joining walking groups can be helpful. I am interested to hear from the witnesses about their experience of patients’ general attitudes towards social prescribing.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
Yes.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
I have a quick question. Hannah Tweed mentioned ALISS, the local information system for Scotland, which is funded by the Scottish Government and delivered by the Health and Social Care Alliance. I would be interested to hear the panel’s thoughts and perceptions of how it is working, because it is a digital and online service that directs people to the social prescribing that is out there.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Alternative Pathways to Primary Care
Meeting date: 8 March 2022
Emma Harper
In relation to its report on social prescribing, which I have in front of me, Support in Mind Scotland says:
“25 to 50% of GP appointments focus on non-medical issues, such as social isolation, financial struggles and bereavement.”
I am aware of RCGP training for signposting, but does that training also cover signposting for social isolation and financial struggles? That question is for Dr Yadav or Dr Williams.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 1 March 2022
Emma Harper
Good morning, cabinet secretary. I have a quick question on the 26-month retention period. Our convener rightly mentioned that that is to do with not contacting survivors on an anniversary that is associated with a reported assault. That is part of it, but there was also a consensus on the 26-month period in the feedback from the consultation. Everybody agreed about that, which is why we have got to this point today.
