WP chairperson Sylvia Lim in a livestreamed Q&A session with Party member Kenneth Foo on Wed (28 Aug).

The Workers’ Party (WP) is doing its best to maximise the limited resources it has and to be an effective representative in Parliament for its voters and their electoral base in general, said Party chairperson Sylvia Lim.
In a question and answer session with former WP Deputy Organising Secretary Kenneth Foo via a livestream on the Workers’ Party Youth Wing Facebook page on Wed (28 Aug), Ms Lim said that WP MPs have tried their best “to be responsible”.
“We feel that when the PAP [People’s Action Party] government is doing something that is in the national interest, we will support it. And if we have some suggestions, or maybe some tweaks, or [see] some areas that they should concentrate on, we will bring it up.
“At the same time, when we find that a particular move we don’t think is in the national interest, or we feel that the risk is too high, then we will take the decision perhaps to vote against it, and to explain why we are not comfortable with it,” she said, touching on WP’s role in Parliament presently as the only opposition party in Parliament.
Ms Lim also believes that the public process in Parliament is “critical for the electorate”, because “if you have debates behind closed doors, then the people are excluded from that [process]”.
As a consequence, members of the public will not be “able to engage on the merits of what each side is raising and what makes more sense to them”.
However, she noted that “debates are recorded and are broadcast on national television”, so “people have a chance to analyse and [figure out] how to engage with an issue, who they think has the better argument”.
“And I think from there, voter education will also take place,” said Ms Lim.
When asked on issues central to WP’s cause in Parliament, Ms Lim said that while political parties should “try to have at least a basic position on a breadth of national issues”, for example defence and foreign affairs, the focal point should remain with “what voters have raised”.
Drawing from her own experience as an MP during meet-ups with residents in her ward in Aljunied GRC, she said voters are primarily concerned about “bread and butter issues” such as cost of living and education expenses, in addition to problems concerning social safety nets and public housing policies.
“These are the issues that confront people daily, so we will still have to pay attention to those issues, because that is what voters care about,” Ms Lim stressed.
Expressing her gratitude to those who have voted for WP representatives and also to the relevant electoral base for having “some faith in WP to be able to do something for Singapore”, Ms Lim said: “We hope that we have not failed them.”
“Of course, we agree that things are never perfect, and there are always things that can be done better, but I think we have tried our best within the circumstances and the resources that we have to try to be good representatives of the people who voted for us,” she added.
WATCH: Sylvia Lim answers questions on WP’s role and current performance in Parliament, her journey into politics

S’poreans should be the best judge of WP’s work in Parliament; WP doing its best with limited resources: Sylvia Lim
When asked on WP’s current performance in Parliament, Ms Lim opined that while it should be left to Singaporeans to “be the best judge of that”, she believes that WP has “played its role to be a check on the government”.
This, she said, can be seen in terms of WP MPs such as herself “filing Parliamentary questions, or taking part in debates on Bills or other motions”.
“Of course, some people think we could’ve done more – and I respect those views – but we are currently working as a party mainly with volunteer resources, so there is always some limitation to that,” she said.
“We don’t have armies of civil servants to come and back us up when there’s a parliamentary debate [laughs] …
“In that sense, I think it’s always going to be an uneven battle, but I think we have tried to maximise whatever is available to us,” said Ms Lim.
Constitutional issues, 2001 snap election motivating factors for entering politics under WP: Sylvia Lim
When asked as to what compelled her to enter politics, particularly as an opposition politician, Ms Lim said that she was exposed to discussions on Singapore’s politics at “family dinner tables growing up”.
Her late father, Lim Choon Mong, used to work quite closely with founding leaders such as the late first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew whilst Mr Lim was serving in the police force before he went on to practice law.
She said that it was part of her family’s culture to listen to such discussions “even though we were probably a little too young to appreciate some of the points he was making”.
However, Ms Lim’s personal interest in politics germinated during her days as a Law undergraduate at the National University of Singapore, where she studied subjects such as constitutional law and the likes.
Such subjects, she said, made her question some of Singapore’s political and government structures.
“We have a system where there are institutions that are supposed to” work as a check-and-balance mechanism for “each other … The question is: How well are they working or not working?” Ms Lim said.
The catalyst that propelled her into joining WP, though, was the snap general election held in 2001 “shortly after the 9/11 attacks in the States”.
“The boundaries were released just shortly before polling day, and many political parties didn’t have time to prepare, so about two-thirds of the seats were not contested in GE2001,” Ms Lim recalled.
“What made me quite angry and worried was that if elections are supposed to be meaningful, then surely they should not be conducted in this way,” she said.
Instead of “just being upset”, said Ms Lim, it was time for her “to do something”.
She wrote to Low Thia Khiang, who was WP chief at the time, and told him she would like to join the party.
“When I entered the Party 18 years ago, it was a very different scenario from what we have in the Workers’ Party today … At that time we didn’t even have enough people to fill all the leadership positions in the council,” said Ms Lim, recounting her early days as a WP member.
“People had to be co-opted, and there were still some vacancies there. And whenever we needed to incur major expense, for example, individually, leaders had to contribute their own money, you know, to do office renovations or whatever, and claim it back later when the Party was on a stronger footing,” she added.
“Fast forward to today, you’ll see that our party, although still small, has a healthy membership, and now we don’t have difficulties filling our leadership positions. In fact there are often fierce contests [laughs] among people who are aspiring to be Party leader,” said Ms Lim.

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