Slot not being passed from action to layout in Symfony 1.4

I'm using the following to set a slot in an action but I can't retrieve it in the layout.

$this->getResponse()-&g开发者_如何学JAVAt;setSlot('global_message', 'You have already completed this contest.');

But if you set this in the template file, it works fine.

Anyone have any ideas on this one?

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It should work. Please provide some code about your controller, view and layout.