"I MAKE the rules" is how SDLP MLA for South Belfast Claire Hanna explains her job to her four-year-old daughter Eimear, who believes that her mummy works in a castle.
Combining her full-time career as a politician with being a mum to her two young daughters is a daily task for 36-year-old Claire, who followed in the footsteps of own mother Carmel (former minister for employment and learning) into the political world.
As the Northern Ireland Assembly resumes business today following the summer recess, Claire is looking forward to the "rollercoaster" ahead – which will include dealing with the implications of Brexit.
“It’s not instinctive to me or the SDLP to be obstructive, but Brexit is so damaging we are still looking at any way to help prevent it happening. It’s so far from a done deal but at the same time you are trying to look down the line and look at what the problems would be and solve them," she tells me.
As well as addressing issues in her constituency, Claire is also hoping to complete the passing of a piece of private members legislation on breastfeeding she has tabled.
"In Scotland there is a really comprehensive breastfeeding bill and in Scotland and Wales it’s covered by an equality bill. Here there is no legislation to protect a breastfeeding mum in public," the politician, who breastfed her own daughters, Eimear and two-year-old Aideen.
"We have remove factors that prevent people breastfeeding and if anxiety in public is a push factor we need to remove it."
As a working mum herself – who works irregular hours and uses daycare – she is also keen to lobby on increasing the amount of free hours pre-school children receive – from 12.5 to 20 hours.
"It’s a big nut to crack but if you look at all the countries that have equality in the workplace and facilitate working parents, they all have fairly universal childcare. Even in England they have 30 hours of free childcare cover for children in their pre-school year. If the Tories are looking after working families better than we are here there is a problem."
A Belfast city councillor since 2011, Claire took over the South Belfast seat in June 2015 after her then party leader Alasdair McDonnell gave it up to bring an end to the practice of double-jobbing.
She's one of five political candidates the cameras followed on the road to the 2016 Northern Ireland Assembly election in Vote, a new documentary for BBC Northern Ireland.
Vote reveals the personal stories behind the candidates putting their livelihoods and reputations on the line, in the fight to be elected. It also considers what drives people to become engaged in political life in Northern Ireland and explores where our political process is taking us.
The programme explores people’s drive to become engaged in politics and although Claire has memories of leaflet dropping for her mother and various other SDLP candidates from the age of seven, she says she was "was never pushed into it".
"There were lots of discussions in our home and a real family commitment to improving this place but mum still would ask me 'Are you sure this is what you want to do with your life?'" she laughs.
"As a family our central discussions evolved around finding an alternative to improve this place and I'm proud to be in a position to help achieve that. You wouldn’t fight an election to hold on to something if you're not enjoying it but it is really full on and it does impact on every area of your life."
While Claire admits feeling guilty about discussing legislation as she pushes her children on the swings at the park, she also admits that being a parent is very grounding.
"There is negativity in politics, but kids don't care what happened in the phone call you just had. There is no chance to wallow in it. So if you do come in and it hasn't been the best day you do snap out of it quite quickly."
Claire's husband Donal Lyons is a Belfast city councillor and works in public policy, so how does she feel about the couple's own children following in their footsteps?
"They can be fairly argumentative when they want to be. Eimer is a wee thinker and Aideen has good concentration – or should I say stubbornness? I will always encourage them to be vocal and interested but, believe me, I won’t be chasing either of them into a route of politics."
Nearly 20 years after the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, this year's assembly election was another test of the people's trust in Northern Ireland's power-sharing government. In Vote, Claire speaks of how "the hope and optimism" she recalls having as a 17-year-old following the signing of the agreement "is gone".
I ask her to expand on her feelings and ask, how does she suggest we get that back?
"I just think there was a real sense of possibility that we had been through something quite traumatic and we could radically change. We haven't made anywhere near the progress we need to on integration and addressing the past," she says.
"We could really have had a 21st century economy, with the finest infrastructure, when you think of the money we got pumped in. Some of those opportunities have been missed. What we need to do is recommit ourselves and somehow purge the cynicism that has built up in politics and people. You only doing that by directly addressing the controversial issues of flags, parading and so forth and start being courageous politically.
“That is what frustrates me so much about Brexit. All the thinking hours from everyone in every single area of life is now going to have to recalibrate around Brexit rather than solving all the problems like the NHS and dealing with the past."
:: Vote will be broadcast on BBC One Northern Ireland on Wednesday September 14 at 10.45pm. It also follows the campaign trails of Alliance's Naomi Long, the UUP's Doug Beattie, Sinn Fein's Megan Fearan and the DUP's Emma Little Pengelly.
