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.
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
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.
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.
There are two types of keyword search:
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.
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
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:
If you search by an individual session, the list of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and committees will automatically update to show only the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ 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.
Displaying 1231 contributions
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Meeting date: 26 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
I want to follow up on some issues that were raised by my colleague Miles Briggs. First, you have said that you will consult on changes to the law of diligence. What will be the likely timescale of that consultation, and what issues it is likely to cover?
Following on from the last question, I know that you said that there is a lack of evidence on arrestments, but I would like to know more about earnings arrestments. Will an evidence-gathering session go hand in hand with that consultation, to make sure that we find the best outcomes?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Meeting date: 26 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
Thank you. I have no more questions, convener.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Meeting date: 26 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
Good morning. How should statutory debt processes in Scotland be designed to improve outcomes specifically for people on low incomes? The Child Poverty Action Group has stated that debt processes should support the Scottish Government’s national mission on child poverty. How do we make that a reality and achieve the correct balance? For example, would it be an option to have different processes in place for those on low incomes or those on benefits?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Meeting date: 26 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
I thank the witnesses for their attendance this morning. As has been said, many people have seen their awards increase as a result of the transfer to ADP, but we are obviously concerned about those who have lost out or will lose out. Can you expand on the different options that have been presented for transitional protection and on what the challenges might be in providing for such schemes?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Meeting date: 26 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
Obviously, mental health issues can be exacerbated by debt, but they can also be brought on by debt. It is a really tricky system and it seems to be exacerbating mental health issues more and more. Figuring out how to tackle that is the issue.
My last question on this theme is whether more retrospective protection should be given to individuals who were provided a loan when the company should reasonably have known, or did not make the effort to confirm, that there was no realistic chance that the individual would be in a position to repay the loan. Some private lenders that have cropped up recently are providing loans and doing very few background checks to make sure that the person’s income is enough to cover it. Should there be more retrospective protection?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 24 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
Good morning, minister. I am looking for clarification on where we are with the discussions that either you or your officials have had with your UK Government counterparts to resolve the concerns that we have highlighted in relation to the LCM. How far along are we? Has there been any progress?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Meeting date: 19 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
Good morning. I thank the witnesses for their contributions so far. On the theme of rent arrears, the importance of early intervention has been highlighted throughout the inquiry. We have already discussed that this morning. How effective have the pre-action requirements that are in place to protect social and private tenants been in avoiding eviction action whenever possible?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Meeting date: 19 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
In the evidence that you provided, you say that the average cost of an eviction of a family is £24,000 and that
“the total cost of social sector evictions in Scotland for the year 2019-20 was £27.8m.â€
Given the financial cost to local authorities and the emotional stress that an eviction can cause a person or a family, eviction does not seem the best way to deal with rent arrears, especially given that somebody will go back into homeless accommodation and will then have to get rehoused—it is a horrible cycle.
What other options do councils have to deal with rent arrears? You have touched on this, but could any further improvements be made to the processes and procedures around the collection of rent arrears in general?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 17 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
Thank you for your helpful response.
We touched on the fact that prepayment customers pay more, which is unfair, and so run the risk of losing their energy supply completely for periods of time. No one should have to experience that. Potentially, there will be elderly people, pregnant women and young children in homes that have no heating at all. More action is needed to protect such people. There have been calls for a social tariff, but the UK Government seems to have dismissed the idea. Do you have thoughts on what more can be done to protect people?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 17 May 2022
Natalie Don-Innes
Absolutely. I will pass back to the convener.