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 łÉČËżěĘÖ and committees will automatically update to show only the łÉČËżěĘÖ and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of łÉČËżěĘÖ and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of łÉČËżěĘÖ 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 761 contributions
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Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Healthcare in Remote and Rural Areas
Meeting date: 21 May 2024
Tess White
Sometimes—well, often—incidents pressure test a system. We have heard about the tragic situation in Portree.
Last week, in my area, a little girl called Ivy Mae Ross tragically died; I know that the thoughts of all of us are with her family. That incident highlighted an issue, in that a specialist operations terror attack unit had to be deployed because ambulances were not available to attend the scene. That was not just a single situation—it has been going on for months. At that time, many ambulances were stacked outside the hospital. On that occasion, there was no negative impact directly from that, but it set alarm bells ringing. Given the unrelenting pressures on the Scottish Ambulance Service in my NHS Grampian area, in particular—although those pressures are not unique to Scotland—will you, as cabinet secretary, review contingency planning for serious incidents such as the ones that I mentioned?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Healthcare in Remote and Rural Areas
Meeting date: 21 May 2024
Tess White
To follow up on that, it is—as you recognise—a huge issue that there are failings in the system and that some hospitals are better than others. However, stacking—for example in the north-east, where half an ambulance fleet is stacked outside the hospital—puts pressure on the system, so it is clear that there is a failing in the wider system. Will you be tackling that as a matter of urgency?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Healthcare in Remote and Rural Areas
Meeting date: 21 May 2024
Tess White
Good morning, cabinet secretary and panel. What consideration is being given to reviewing urgent care and accident and emergency provision in remote and rural areas?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Food Standards Scotland
Meeting date: 7 May 2024
Tess White
At the moment, there is a craze for the carnivore, paleo and keto diets. A particularly successful group sticks in my mind. It sprang up during Covid and took hold of social media post-Covid. There is evidence on those diets from doctors in the States, who quote a Harvard University study. In social media questionnaires on the keto and paleo diets, people say that they are taking control and getting their nutrients from red meat and eggs. That flies in the face of what you say in your report, which is that people should eat less red meat.
Do you have a view on that yet, or will you take it to your board, which is listening to what is going on? As I said, that type of diet is taking a huge hold right now.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Food Standards Scotland
Meeting date: 7 May 2024
Tess White
Thank you for coming. I have two questions, which build on those that David Torrance asked. Has Food Standards Scotland undertaken any work to influence the school curriculum? As David said, children are more likely to go on social media and apps such as TikTok and Instagram, in particular. Is your work having an impact on the school curriculum?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Food Standards Scotland
Meeting date: 7 May 2024
Tess White
Sorry—are you aware that that is going on?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Food Standards Scotland
Meeting date: 7 May 2024
Tess White
Getting your nutrients from red meat flies in the face of evidence that says, “eat less red meat”, and counteracts the point about heavily processed food.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Food Standards Scotland
Meeting date: 7 May 2024
Tess White
That is good, thank you. Are you looking at search engines when updating your website, so that it becomes a go-to site?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People
Meeting date: 7 May 2024
Tess White
Good morning, Dr Cass. Is there, in the 32 recommendations in what is a very comprehensive report, anything specific in relation to the delivery of services that you believe could apply in a Scottish context?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People
Meeting date: 7 May 2024
Tess White
I turn to my second question. In your answer to Ruth Maguire’s question, you talked about the importance of the evidence base and collaboration. How do you feel about the fact that certain factions of the Scottish Green Party have said that your work is a “social murder charter”?
