‘Important but not equivalent’: WP chair Sylvia Lim on the role of NCMPs

SINGAPORE: When Workers’ Party (WP) chair Sylvia Lim sat down with Non-constituency Members of Parliament Eileen Chong and Andre Low in the second episode of their podcast, “This side of the house,” the discussion was as much about the newbies’ experience in Parliament as it was about the scheme itself and Ms Lim’s experiences.

Ms Lim, the WP’s very own “Mama Bear,” served as an NCMP from 2006 to 2011. Since then, she has represented Aljunied in Parliament for the past 14 years. In the episode, posted on Nov 24, the three discussed how far the scheme has come since Ms Lim’s NCMP days, including how it gets affected by social media today, and how much NCMPs’ voting rights have grown.

However, the WP chair highlighted a key distinction that persists: the scheme does not allow the party of an NCMP to deliver grassroots services on the ground, since NCMPs have no constituency to look after.

She quoted former WP chief Low Thia Khiang as saying that NCMPs are “like duckweed,” in the sense of not being rooted.

“You’re sort of neither here nor there, in a way,” Ms Lim added.

Nevertheless, she underlined that while being an NCMP is “an important platform in Parliament” as it gives individuals the opportunity to show they can raise issues important to the public and hold their own during debates, “but we can never say that they are equivalent.”

Nevertheless, with the WP winning 10 seats over the past two election cycles, Ms Lim added that “the public can see the big picture” of having the opposition as elected MPs and not just taking the assured “biggest loser” seats.

Following this train of thought, Mr Low and Ms Chong later joked that they would like to be Singapore’s last two NCMPs.

The party’s Mama Bear then asked the two younger leaders how their maiden speeches in Parliament had gone, giving Ms Chong and Mr Low the chance to discuss issues affecting Singaporeans that they had brought to the table. For Mr Low, it’s strengthening social safety nets, and for Ms Chong, it’s the unpaid work that young mothers do.

Ms Lim also noted Mr Low and Ms Chong for having spoken about the Online Safety Bill, praising Mr Low for the amount of research he did in preparation for his speech. She commended both for having learned a lot in the past two months, saying that during her time, she could not have done this kind of work. /TISG

Read related: Andre Low, Eileen Chong say they’re ‘humbled’ and ‘honoured’ to serve as NCMPs