Singapore’s members of parliament receive an allowance to engage legislative assistants to help them with their parliamentary questions and speeches. Different members adopt different strategies and use the allowance differently. Some have larger teams who split the allowance, and in other instances volunteers may also be involved. Across two episodes, we learn more about the roles, responsibilities, and motivations of legislative assistants, the process behind drafting and re-drafting parliamentary questions and speeches, as well as how parliamentarians and their teams integrate feedback from walkabouts.

Today, in this first part, we hear from Louis Ng Kok Kwang, a member of the governing People's Action Party. He was previously on this podcast, highlighting his advocacy for social work and social workers in parliament.

This episode is part of the "Civic Engagement and Action" series of the podcast's sixth season (https://socialservice.sg/podcast/). The feature photo is by VENUS MAJOR on Unsplash.