Somewhere in my loft, I have a copy of this book: “The Sceptical Feminist. A philosophical enquiry.” By Janet Radcliffe-Richards.

I bought it in 1982, when the paperback came out, and one thing from it has lived with me ever since:

If a person’s or organisation’s given reason for promoting a particular policy or course of action is shown to be false, you can’t know what the real reason is, but you are entitled to publicly speculate what it might be.  And to raise that as a further question.  Repeat until you’ve got somewhere near the truth.

The ‘five whys’ approach isn’t just for business problem solving.  It’s a habit we should all get into when dealing with those who govern us.

Discipline makes Daring possible.