FM Conway - Going the Extra Mile

Chapter 2 A Change of Guard

Plant in the yard at 32 Ancaster Road. Penge Plant Hire Ltd. was a subsidiary company that Dad started to make money from the plant when he wasn’t using it himself. Even in bad years like 1978, when the company’s fortunes were running at their lowest ebb, there was some kind of wage increase. However, inflation had been running at over 15% since 1974 and was going to remain at well over 10% for three more years to come.

they were not our first priority. Getting the work in was a much more urgent matter. We didn’t have enough of it; in fact, we had next to nothing. Turnover, which had peaked at £700,000 in 1975, was now down to below £300,000.

I was using the few jobs that we did have to get to know the men. I had recently taken on a new foreman, Alan Hart, who had been one of Dad’s business partners fifteen years before. Alan was a good asphalter, but had quite a temper, and he was handy with his fists – in fact, he was an accomplished amateur boxer. He was known to the men as ‘Jaws’

39