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.
Criathragan Hide all filters
Displaying 1011 contributions
|
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee [Draft]
Transparency of Intergovernmental Activity
Meeting date: 2 October 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
Good morning. I want to look at some of the practical aspects. We have just been discussing some of the suggestions that have come up. I had an angle that I was going to look at, but some of our witnesses’ contributions have sent me off in different directions so I hope that I will be able to bring some focus to my questioning.
I will come to Professor McEwen first. We have just been discussing timings, transparency and awareness. I am not aware whether the Scottish Government has to publish a list of meetings that ministers will have each week. Are you aware of anything like that? I am imagining something almost like a court circular, which says, “The Minister for X will be meeting Y.”
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee [Draft]
Transparency of Intergovernmental Activity
Meeting date: 2 October 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
Thank you. Do any of the other panellists want to comment?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee [Draft]
Transparency of Intergovernmental Activity
Meeting date: 2 October 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
Is that reporting done ahead of meetings or after they have been held?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee [Draft]
Transparency of Intergovernmental Activity
Meeting date: 2 October 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
I was wondering whether a process was already in place whereby, once a meeting was proposed or confirmed, the details went online and there was a duty to provide the relevant information and the minutes.
That moves me on to another point about concerns over the recording of what actually happens. The panel has said that what is published or provided is not always particularly detailed. Do we know whether that information is recorded in detail, but we are seeing only a small part of it? In some cases is there a concern that the focus on providing full information is perhaps not being undertaken?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee [Draft]
Transparency of Intergovernmental Activity
Meeting date: 2 October 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
Thank you very much. Dr Anderson, do you want to come in on that?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee [Draft]
Transparency of Intergovernmental Activity
Meeting date: 2 October 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
The day-to-day work—the bread and butter of IGR—is probably happening in a better way than we can see. From our point of view, as parliamentarians, the issue is that we are not seeing enough of it, or enough of the decision-making processes at the front of it all.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Pre-Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 25 September 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
Good morning. I am grateful that the cabinet secretary has agreed to come back to talk to us about the situation at Historic Environment Scotland. I appreciate the fact that he recognises that it is an important issue and that he recognises the importance of the cultural offering in Orkney, which I am always keen to highlight. I am sure that he will have enjoyed Orkney’s cultural offering in the past.
You mentioned some of the relationships that you have with other organisations, such as the enterprise bodies, in addition to those that you have with the likes of Creative Scotland. The budgets for some of our enterprise bodies are tighter and more focused, and local government budgets are under real pressure across Scotland. What are your thoughts on how that is having an impact on the culture sector? How are you trying to address that? What are your concerns in that regard?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Pre-Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 25 September 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
Mr Harvie, you can go next.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Pre-Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 25 September 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
Yes, of course.
You are talking about festivals and the like. For a lot of the smaller venues and museums and so on, particularly in rural areas, there is a long period of the year when they are not getting very high visitor numbers. Can you think of anything that could be done in the winter or in the quiet months to support them?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Pre-Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 25 September 2025
Jamie Halcro Johnston
You moved on to, and possibly through, my second question, which was going to be about the issues that have been raised about attendance at museums and other cultural sites, and how we can make sure that the numbers are there and that there are no gaps in funding. Creative Scotland highlighted the issue of business development support, which is important.
Therefore, I will move on to my third question, which is about Government policy. I asked Creative Scotland about the impacts of the regulation of short-term lets. In my area of Orkney, which we have talked about, that has led to a considerable number of bed losses, which means that fewer people are coming. Although the visitor levy has been rejected by Orkney Islands Council, it is being considered by other councils.
One of the issues that organisations raised with me—and they were not always the accommodation providers, but sometimes people in ancillary parts of the sector—was about there being less money in people’s pockets. The concern is that, if people do not have so much money in their pockets, they will not spend as much in a community, even if they still visit it.
Another issue that was raised with me in relation to the proposed legislation for a cruise ships levy was that boats may still come, but they may make fewer stops in Orkney.
If you are working positively for the cultural sector, how do you make sure that some of the other Government policies are not reducing the amount of money in people’s pockets or the money going through into communities that they visit? How do you ensure that policy is lined up in relation to your aims for the cultural sector?
