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 3527 contributions
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 19 April 2023
Audrey Nicoll
Our next item of business is consideration of evidence on the Children (Care and Justice) (Scotland) Bill. I welcome to the meeting Angela Constance, the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs; Natalie Don, the Minister for Children, Young People and Keeping the Promise; and, from the Scottish Government, Catriona Dalrymple, who is the deputy director of community justice, Tom McNamara, who is the head of youth justice and children’s hearings, and Barry McCaffrey, who is a lawyer. We give a warm welcome to you all.
I take this opportunity to welcome both ministers to their new roles and to thank the former cabinet secretary, Keith Brown, for his engagement with the committee over recent years.
I refer members to papers 1 and 2. I intend to allow up to 90 minutes for this evidence session. On that note, I invite the cabinet secretary and/or the minister to make some brief opening remarks.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 19 April 2023
Audrey Nicoll
Thank you very much, minister. As usual, I will start the questions and then bring in members.
Minister, in your opening remarks, you mentioned some of the witnesses who we have already heard from and some of the very helpful evidence that we have heard. I will start by looking at the issues around age. One of the main provisions of the bill is that people under the age of 18 are no longer placed in a YOI or prison. The committee heard evidence from a range of witnesses that there should perhaps be more scope for an individualised assessment process to determine whether and where a child or young person should be detained. That would be based on factors such as their development, maturity and, perhaps, their neurological development. Aside from the issue around resources, are there any other particular barriers to being able to provide an individualised assessment process for children who are entering the criminal justice system and, potentially, a secure environment?
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
I remind members to make sure that our lines of questioning are not about a specific case but about the bill.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
There is a lot to cover. In the spirit of time keeping, I will bring in Wendy Sinclair-Gieben.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
I want to pick up on a point that Lorraine Johnstone made earlier. Lorraine, you said that secure care centres could potentially accommodate young offenders who have done something serious, but that restructuring and training would be needed. Are you aware of whether there has been any of that, or have you had any engagement with the Scottish Government about the potential for it and what additional resources would be necessary?
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
So, the panel broadly welcomes the bill as a fairly good start, but with some caveats. On that note, I will move straight to members’ questions.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
That is nice and succinct.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
Before I bring in Rona Mackay, I would like to let members and witnesses know that I can extend the session. We are covering a lot of important ground, and I am keen that as many questions and responses as possible can be heard. On that basis, assuming that our witnesses are able to stay a little bit longer if required, I will extend the session. If need be, we will reschedule our final agenda item to just after Easter recess. I take it that that is acceptable.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
Thank you very much. I will open up the discussion to members.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 29 March 2023
Audrey Nicoll
Members will be interested in that issue about victim notification and the differences between situations when the perpetrator is a child versus when they are an adult.
I want to pick up on the broad work that you do. Over time, have you seen changes in the number of children who you support or the profiles of the children who you support? I would like a general overview of how things are developing.