In your opinion, how can the government better understand the differing concerns that citizens have, so that it can make decisions that would benefit society? Explain your answer with reference to two ways.
One way that the government can better understand the differing priorities of citizens is to carry out surveys over multiple platforms The government can send out hard copy population surveys to the groups who do not have smartphones or prefer hard copy or set up an online portal with the survey on it for those who are busy and on the go. The government can also print out QR codes and paste them at the lift lobbies of HDB estates for citizens to scan and respond to. The questions would require citizens to rank their current priorities and areas of interest [Description and example]. Through this, more groups of people could access the survey and the government can capture more information on the differing priorities of the citizens. With more information on the opinions of the people, the government can customize or amend the policies to better address the locals’ concerns (Explain).
Another way is to conduct meet and greet sessions. These sessions would be carried out at the community levels at HDB void decks or community centres.[Description] The Members of Parliament (MP) in charge of the Group Representation Constituency (GRC) can hold these meet-and-greet sessions with the residents of their estates every two months. During these sessions, the MPs can ask the citizens to share their views and concerns to find out more about their priorities [Example]. This helps the government to gain greater insight into the perspectives of citizens who may be more willing to share in private, smaller group settings. This allows the government to change the current policies to allocate the limited resources more efficiently to address the peoples’ concerns [Explain].