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 ˿ and committees will automatically update to show only the ˿ and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of ˿ and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of ˿ 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 1066 contributions
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Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee [Draft]
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 23 April 2025
David Torrance
Perhaps the committee would consider writing to the Scottish Government to seek its views on whether, in the interests of safety and parity with formal campsites and areas, landowners who allow overnight motorhome habitation should be required to obtain a licence for that activity.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee [Draft]
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 23 April 2025
David Torrance
I am in full agreement that we should pass the petition to the Criminal Justice Committee, because it would have far more time for an investigation than this committee would.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee [Draft]
New Petitions
Meeting date: 23 April 2025
David Torrance
Perhaps the committee could consider writing to stakeholders to seek their views on the action that the petition calls for. Those stakeholders should include COSLA; Connect, which was formerly the Scottish Parent Teacher Council; the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland; Together, the Scottish Alliance for Children’s Rights; and the Scottish Youth Parliament.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee [Draft]
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 23 April 2025
David Torrance
In the light of the information that we have received, I ask the committee to consider closing the petition under rule 15.7 of standard orders, on the basis that the charter of rights for people affected by substance use has now been introduced, and that the Scottish Government’s policy on image and performance-enhancing drugs is that it will continue to support Police Scotland in tackling any criminality, and to support local treatment and recovery services to provide help for people who have been impacted by drugs of any kind, including IPEDs.
I suggest that the committee, in closing the petition, might wish to write to the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee to highlight the petition and to ask that the issues that it raises be considered as part of further work on cross-committee scrutiny of matters related to reducing drug deaths and tackling problem drug use.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee (Draft)
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 2 April 2025
David Torrance
I find this quite difficult but, in the light of the evidence and the responses that we have had, I do not know whether the committee can take the petition any further. I would like us to consider closing the petition, under rule 15.7 of standing orders, on the basis that the Law Society of Scotland, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and the Scottish Government consider that the definition of “ordinarily resident” in common law is widely recognised and accepted, and that disputes about whether someone is ordinarily resident in Scotland can be taken to court. Further, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service has progressed improvements on issues, including new guidance on reporting and investigating deaths that happen abroad, as well as a new memorandum of understanding with the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee (Draft)
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 2 April 2025
David Torrance
To add to that, I wonder whether the committee could just write—
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee (Draft)
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 2 April 2025
David Torrance
I will bow to your wisdom, convener.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee (Draft)
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 2 April 2025
David Torrance
I withdraw my recommendations.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee (Draft)
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 2 April 2025
David Torrance
In the light of the lack of evidence that the committee has received, should the committee consider closing the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders, on the basis that the responses to the consultation on ending the sale of energy drinks to children and young people did not raise any issues associated with fast-release caffeine gum? The UK Athletics supplements position statement provides athletes with clear advice on how to reduce risk in the use of supplements, which would include fast-release caffeine gum, and the Scottish Government previously indicated that it will not be pursuing research on fast-release caffeine products at this time.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee (Draft)
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 2 April 2025
David Torrance
The petitioner has achieved their aims, although slightly later than they would have wanted. Given that fact, and the evidence that we have been given, the committee should consider closing the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders on the basis that the Scottish Government has published its international culture strategy, which noted that the review was under way, and states that the Scotland + Venice project has been an important platform through which to showcase Scottish creative practitioners. Further, the review into Scotland’s participation in the Venice biennale has now concluded and Creative Scotland and partners are expected to publish it in the coming weeks and to set out plans for participation in the Scotland + Venice project in 2026.
