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 成人快手 and committees will automatically update to show only the 成人快手 and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of 成人快手 and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of 成人快手 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 831 contributions
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Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Welfare of Dogs (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 22 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
What is your view on concerns raised by the minister that a registration scheme could provide false assurance to potential buyers? Do you refute that view, or do you share it?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
You have mentioned some of the things that you are doing on that front. Clearly, farmers are committed to environmental and animal welfare aims鈥攁s, I am sure, you are. You mentioned some interventions, but the big influence that you have is, of course, the price that you are prepared to pay. How do you ensure that the price that you are prepared to pay is having the right influence and is not creating perverse incentives or pressures that are difficult for farmers to reconcile with the high aims?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
I have a question on the way in which the operation of snaring offences under the bill might work. I wonder whether anyone has a view on how vicarious liability, which the committee has touched on before, might apply, and what the consequences of it might be.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
How does the market share compare with that in other European countries?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
I share the convener鈥檚 disappointment that some of the supermarkets have chosen to not turn up. That is not something that I can hold the witnesses responsible for, and I will not.
The figures that I have show that 60 per cent of the market for the food that is being sold in the UK鈥攔ather than just Scotland鈥攊s in the hands of five retailers. However, in many towns across Scotland, you could replace that number with two or three retailers. Can such a situation go on forever without people asking whether it is entirely healthy?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
I appreciate that you have touched on this, Mike, and that others have touched on it as well. I also appreciate that there is no law or legal framework for you to operate within yet. However, so that people who are looking in can understand what option 2 is and what compromise is, can somebody from the police, the SSPCA or anyone else say whether they have a shared understanding of who does what under that option?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
Can you say a bit more about your work with farmers and others to ensure high standards in environmental and animal welfare? You just touched on that, but will you comment specifically on how that is scrutinised, reported and assessed by you?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
I appreciate what you are saying about the fact that a final decision is still to be made, but, on vicarious liability, what likely consequences might there be under the legislation? For example, if someone on a farm or an estate uses a snare illegally, what might the options be for consequences? Could something be done in relation to support under agricultural payments, for example?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
You mentioned the fact that most European countries have banned snares altogether. What have you learned from those examples, whether they relate to vicarious liability or anything else? My understanding is that the United Kingdom is one of only six countries left in Europe that even has the option of snaring. What lessons have you learned from other places?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Alasdair Allan
Could you say a little bit about the circumstances in which you think, from the evidence that you have, that snaring is still used legally and about the arguments that are put forward for its being used legally? Also, you mentioned that you would like to see a ban on the use but not the sale of snares. Could you say a bit more about the reasoning behind that?
