SINGAPORE — Member of Parliament and animal welfare activist Louis
Ng is planning to walk in the shoes of ordinary Singaporeans —
literally, by taking on jobs as a GrabCar driver, a healthcare
worker, a coffeeshop assistant and a police officer, among others,
for at least a day every month.
Sharing this plan in a Facebook post yesterday (Nov 3), Mr Ng, who
was elected MP for Nee Soon GRC in the Sept 11 polls, said to
“really understand and really see what’s happening on the ground”
and make a difference, he wanted to gain some first-hand
experience.
When contacted, Mr Ng, who is also founder and executive director
of Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (ACRES), said he
had been thinking about which issues to raise in Parliament when
the House sits in January — the first sitting after the General
Election.
While MPs traditionally engage residents through house visits,
dialogue sessions and Meet-the-People Sessions, he wanted to do so
by going to the ground, he said. “(For example) with
cleaners...it’s a way to understand municipal issues,” he said.
He
hopes to do one stint every month for the next five years, and aims
to return to these jobs so that they are not once-off affairs. “I’m
really excited about this, gaining more experience and using these
experiences to help draft my questions in Parliament and help
improve policies in Singapore,” Mr Ng said.
His first stint takes place this month at Khoo Teck Puat Hospital,
where he will serve as a healthcare worker in a C Class ward for
one full shift. There, he hopes to engage the staff and patients.
“I will do every thing a healthcare worker does in his or her
normal shift and do an actual shift at the hospital. From this
experience, I hope to not only see how we can help healthcare
workers but also how we can make things better for hospital
patients,” Mr Ng wrote in his post.
Next month, he will be a GrabCar driver, where he will offer free
rides to passengers while soliciting views from them. He will
donate the value of the rides towards buying Christmas presents for
the children of Nee Soon residents living in rental flats.
In January, he will try out being a town council cleaner — noting
this was appropriate as he is also chairman of Nee-Soon Town
Council. And he is in talks with the Singapore Police Force, in
hopes of joining one of their Community Policing Units for
neighbourhood patrol.
Other experiences he is planning to take on include a wildlife
rescue officer and a secondary school student, and he also urged
the public to put up suggestions.
Last year, eight French politicians disguised themselves as
citizens struggling with real-world problems — such as using a
wheelchair for a day and trying to find affordable housing as a
low-income citizen — for a television programme. The aim was to
raise awareness of social issues and draw lessons from the
experience, but the move also drew brickbats from political
watchers who called it a gimmick.
In 2013, then-Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg went
undercover as a taxi driver to engage citizens, footage of which he
later released as a campaign video for elections that year. Mr
Stoltenberg, who had served eight years as Prime Minister, did not
win a third term in office.
Asked whether his stints could be seen as a stunt, and whether it
would impose on the operations of various organisations, Mr Ng
stressed that he was there to work and help as much as he can. “I
told Khoo Teck Puat, ‘no special treatment’,” he said. “I think
there will always be negative comments, but I genuinely want to
gain experience...I’m very positive there will be positive
change.”