Not long after I moved to Darlo I saw an advert for a H&S manager for a Kitchen workbench company in Shildon. Unaware that it belonged to George I was invited for an interview. It wasn't George who I met but an associate of his. He explained that George had been sailing close to the wind and it was only a matter of time before the HSE closed the place down. He took me for a tour of the factory. It was absolutely spotless. There was not a grain of dust anywhere. I saw a number of employees but they never spoke -not even to each other.I remarked upon this. The associate told me they were not allowed to speak at work. They don't get paid for talking. I also noticed that some of the employees overalls were literally rags. I remarked upon this too. "George pays them for making workbenches, not for prancing about in fancy overalls." I asked if George knew I was being interviewed for this role. "No, but I can always sweet talk him".
That night, in the club I was speaking to one of my friends about this who told me all about George Reynolds.
The factory workers got paid cash in hand, they had to pay their own tax and NI. George paid them what he thought they were worth if, in his opinion, they had worked hard enough. Some people never got paid and were sacked on the spot. If George was in a bad mood or turned up with a hangover then it was guaranteed that someone would lose their job that day.
One infamous story is that George was seen scratching his initials on a car belonging to one of the apprentices.
Asked why he did this he replied "He scratched my worktop, I scratch his car."
When a person becomes unemployed there was usually a wait of a few weeks while the Job Centre investigated the reason for that person becoming unemployed.
If a person said that they had worked for George Reynold the JC did not bother with any enquiries but paid the person from day one. They were so used to this behaviour.
Oh the stories I could tell about that man.
