Quote of the day 17th April 2017
Nick Herbert on his visit to flood hit areas of Cumbria
Please note that the post below was published more than ten year ago on 21st November 2009 Nick Herbert MP, shadow cabinet member for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs, was in Cumbria this morning to see the areas affected by the flooding. He writes on Conservative Home about his visit. Here is an extract. I’ve been in Cumbria today to see the areas affected by the floods. I arrived early in Keswick where I met officials from the Environment Agency. Although the river levels had fallen considerably and homes were no longer flooded, the damage to homes had been done. And the water which had got into houses wasn’t just from the river – it was foul water which had risen from the drains. I talked to fire crews who were pumping flood water back into the river, and discovered that they were from Tyne & Wear and Lancashire. They had been called in at an hours’ notice and had been working on the scene ever since, staying at a local hotel. You cannot fail to be impressed by the...
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And then there are further exeptions to this rule. He who does ask a qustion has to sit though a load of rubbish, and can wait for ever, but still wont get an answer.
The key message of this quote is that some people are often afraid to ask a question for fear that it might be seen as a silly question and make them look like a fool, but it is usually wise to overcome that fear and ask the question anyway.
In my experience, one can often defuse a negative reaction to a question, even a question to which everyone present knows that you actually should know the answer, by prefixing it with some variant of
"Look, my apologies if this is a silly question and I probably should know the answer to this, but just to make absolutely sure I've got it right ..."
Very few people will jump on you for asking a question in this manner, because even if having to go through it again is mildly irritating, having you get it wrong at a critical point is usually far worse.
And the consequence for yourself and others of asking a question are usually far less serious than those of not asking it and consequently getting something badly wrong.