Episode 4 Show Me What You're Made Of

Noah, Kazia,

Josh, Safia and Hansa

are over halfway through their working tour of the UK.

Today, we're travelling nearly 200 miles north-east

to the seaside town of Grimsby -

a place where working with fish

has been a way of life for generations.

I've brought our children to the world-famous Grimsby Fish Market.

Grimsby was once the biggest port in the world,

and now has the nickname of Food Town

because it has the highest concentration

of companies processing foods and fish of anywhere in Europe.

I think our five have an idea

of where they're going to be working today.

That's right, they're in a fish factory.

Today our pampered five face one of their biggest fears.

It's really cold and slimy. Ew.

But can they put their problem with slime aside

as they start work for a strict boss in a giant fish factory?

Don't be rude. You're wasting my time.

And can the girls finally beat the boys?

It would be OK if you actually would do your job properly.

'Or will it all end in tears?'

You need to not panic. You're totally panicking and I don't know why.

18,000 tonnes of fish are sold here

at the Grimsby Fish Market every year.

That's enough fish to cover Wembley's pitch twice over.

If Kazia, Josh, Hans, Safia and Noah are going to spend

the next two days working with fish like these cod,

they need to get used to handling them.

Is it a tuna?

No, this is a cod.

The next stage that you're going to say, I'm guessing,

if you want to touch, help yourself.

HE SCREAMS

That is horrible!

They'll string you up round here for that.

There you go. Come on, don't back up. Don't back up. This way.

Yeah.

-SHE SQUEALS

-Just on there like that.

-GIRLS SQUEAL

-Oh, my God!

It's horrible. Please take it off me.

-Ew. Ew.

-SHE SCREAMS

With this reaction,

how will they manage two days' work in a fish factory?

I don't like it.

Grimsby Fish Market used to be jam-packed with fish caught locally.

But because of overfishing, supplies started running out

and nowadays fish are brought here from all over the world.

Grimsby is full of fish factories like this one.

Havelok prepare and supply fish to restaurants, supermarkets

and maybe even your school canteen.

Will our five overcome their fishy phobia here?

HE LAUGHS

So funny.

The smell in there.

It smells like someone is trying to cover up the smell of fish.

It smells of that stuff that you put,

like, you put over sick at school to make it, like...

What you need to remember is that the guys that work here,

they've been working here for a couple of years now,

so it's standard to them, yeah?

So if you go in and say, "Ew, your office really smells,

"your factory stinks", it's not a good first impression, is it?

-OK?

-OK.

We'll go and meet your bosses. Follow me. Come on in.

How do you do, John? How's things?

-Yeah, great, thank you.

-And Darren.

-Nice to meet you. Are you all right?

Meet our five. These are your bosses for the next couple of days.

-Morning.

-Morning.

We're a multimillion pound fish-processing business.

We process, oh, about 100 ton of fish a week.

That's an astonishing amount of fish. This year alone you have supplied?

Around 20 million meals.

Guys, you're in the wrong place to be not liking fish.

Grimsby is where it's at.

Course it is. Food Town, this.

Hansa, are you going to be OK over the next couple of days?

Eh, fish and I don't get on.

-Fish and you don't get on.

-Yeah.

-Oh, dearie me.

It might be a long few days.

So my understanding is that we need to get them changed...

-KIDS:

-What?!

-..and then we're able to have a look around.

-Yep.

Changed?! Like, in to what?

-Into your uniform.

-Again?

KIDS TALK OVER EACH OTHER

OK, guys, do you want to follow your bosses?

Thank you very much.

Don't forget your hairnets, girls.

In fact, it's hairnets for everyone, along with wellies and overalls,

and that's not all.

First thing is, for the girls, no make-up, no nail varnish.

-I just done my nails last night.

-Last night.

-Literally.

Of course, getting into trouble over make-up is nothing

new for these girls.

Our teen queens seem more concerned with more concerned with their looks

than with making a good impression on the factory floor.

We got up early to do this.

In the first two factories,

showman Noah beat them to the title of star employee.

I'm no longer a 13-year-old boy. I'm the boss.

And in the bus garage...

What are you doing?

..Josh wiped the floor with the girls to become reigning champ.

With only two factories left, our girls are running out of chances.

If you could make sure for tomorrow, don't come with the make-up on.

-I don't want to go through this again. It's a waste of time.

-OK.

-OK?

Noah, what do you make of the girls having to take their make-up off?

I'm sorry, but they look exactly the same.

-GIRLS EXCLAIM

-You're not allowed to say that!

-I look so bad without make-up.

-My God, Noah.

Kaz, don't worry about what you look like.

This is not the best way to win over new boss Darren.

Let's hope the girls can turn it around on the fish factory floor.

Our five will be taking charge at the start of a busy production line.

Darren has to fulfil a large order or battered cod fillets.

The whole factory relies on a steady stream of fish

moving along this conveyor belt.

All our kids have to do is keep feeding fish on to it.

Who likes fish and chips?

-Me.

-Right, well, that's what we're making today.

We're making battered fish.

We need to feed 60 pieces a minute. That's one piece per second.

One piece per second, OK? It's doable.

You can achieve this if you set your mind to it

and you work as hard as the other workers here in the fish factory, OK?

-We all clear? Happy?

-All right, guys.

Eager to impress, Hansa and Kazia get off to an enthusiastic start.

Maybe a little too enthusiastic.

THEY LAUGH

That is so much fish.

With each bag of fish worth £50,

the kids are literally throwing money on the floor.

Poor old Josh does seem to be a bit overwhelmed

with all of these fillets.

Every time I look over, the mountain is rising.

Come over here quickly.

You're going to fill the table faster

than the guys are feeding it on to the line.

So what I want you to do is tip it on a little bit more careful

and then one of you stay behind and help Josh split the fillets.

Saf seems to be knuckling down,

despite not being the biggest fan of the job.

My hands are really cold.

It's like the gloves aren't...

The gloves aren't doing much to stop them from getting cold.

If I did this all day, it'd be like, "Ugh."

I'd get frostbite or something.

Further down the line, there's a problem.

Darren does a spot check.

How are they doing?

We're only running at 50% performance,

so we need to double the speed.

The kids are slowing down the whole production line.

Darren is forced to take action.

Right, guys, we're going to stop what we're doing.

We're going to move everyone around. We need to get the focus back again.

At first, things seem to get better.

I'm doing OK. It's quite hectic, though.

Cos if you forget to do one thing,

then the whole rest of the line fails, so it's a bit of pressure.

But then something else goes wrong.

Boss Darren suddenly has to stop the machine.

Production grinds to a halt.

In their haste, the girls have knocked the bell

and pushed it out of line.

I think the conveyor belt moved, cos on each of the sides,

I think we were trying to do each other's side

and bending over to do each other's side.

Darren realigns the belt so work can resume.

But the kids can't pull together and an argument breaks out.

I'm sorry but like the guys have always worked really hard,

but the girls have had their moments of, "I can't be bothered."

Right, I'm not being funny, but you're saying that we're doing

all this bad and we've found so many stuck together it's unreal, so...

It would be OK if you could actually do your job properly.

Darren has had enough.

Guys, come away from the line.

We'll talk about the performance and how well we've done.

What we need to do, we need to work as a team, talk a little bit less

and concentrate on your tasks when you're on the lines.

If you could tell us very quickly how each of them have done. Josh?

-Josh did quite well.

-Yeah?

-So did Saf.

What I would call a bit old-school.

She's got her head down and she's got on with it,

which is really good to see. Kazia, good and bad.

When you first started feeding, you was keen.

Then you started to chat a little bit too much.

Same with Hansa, really.

Between you, as a pair, you wasn't my best feeding pair.

I think you're capable, but you need to apply yourself.

-And Noah?

-Same for Noah, really. Your workload is good, Noah,

but if our hands moved as fast as our mouths today,

we'd have got 100%.

Guys that are going to be promoted are Saf and Josh.

And the three of you, you're demoted.

To be honest, it's fair enough.

I'm a bit gutted because I have never been promoted.

Next shift, I'm going to come in with a really positive attitude.

I have said that every single time.

At least one of our girls has managed a promotion.

I am well chuffed that I actually got one over Noah, now.

Now it's time to beat, like, my next opponent, which is Josh.

This lot are so pampered at home

they still don't know the real meaning of hard work.

So I've arranged for promoted Josh and Saf to meet someone who does.

Rick is the supervisor at the factory.

They all moaned about working with fish for one hour,

he has worked with fish for 19 years.

He's invited Saf and Josh to join him, daughters Ruby and Eve

and their cousin Lucy.

How many hours do you work a week?

Anywhere between 50 and 60.

What time do you have to get up and go out to work?

I get up at three o'clock every morning

when I'm on the morning shift, because I start at four o'clock.

Some days I don't get back in here till about 3.30,

four o'clock. So one day is...

That's really... That's a long time.

It's a lot of hours. I don't get tired while I'm there.

It's when I get home and sit down, that's when it hits me.

I get really tired.

How often do you see your dad?

Well, one week we see him at tea-time after school.

Then we go to bed.

Then the other week, we'll see him before school.

On that shift, I see them for about probably an hour a day.

Obviously it would be nice to see him a bit more,

but we do understand, like, why he's working.

He's working for us and how grateful we are for it.

I thought it was really sad that he only sees his kids

for, like, an hour a day.

I think it was really nice that he were doing it for them though.

Across the other side of time,

I'm taking demoted Noah, Kazia and Hansa for a different reality check.

These guys have everything they could possibly want at home,

so I'm bringing them to meet a young couple who take nothing for granted.

Maintenance man Adam and his girlfriend Donna,

who works in a different fish factory,

live here with their three-year-old daughter Whitney.

I love my job.

It's just the atmosphere and the people that's there.

We all get the job done.

Growing up, I kind of always knew I'd, at some point in my life,

work at a fish factory, cos I'm from Grimsby. It's what we do.

DONNA LAUGHS

Donna, these three when they were working at the fish factory today,

they were quite dismissive. Do you think people are quite fussy?

Oh, there's been a few times I've not wanted to go to work,

but if I don't go to work, I don't have money.

If I don't have money, we can't pay bills, we can't do what we want.

Yeah, it's got to be done to get by, really.

Give Whitney the best of what we can whilst she's young.

Adam shows Hansa, Kazia and Noah just how difficult

he finds it to maintain their home on the family's income.

Front room, but it's supposed to be Whitney's playroom.

As you can see, we've got damp in here,

so it's not a very good place for Whitney to come and stay.

Somehow, it's just ended up being a little storage room.

I have been asking myself to get it up to good, but unfortunately

I haven't got the money to do that as well as pay rent on top of it.

Yeah, this is it, isn't it?

Sometimes you have to just make tough decisions -

treat damp or you feed Whitney.

Yeah. And I choose to feed Whitney.

For our three kids, money is never a concern.

So how much pocket money do you all get?

Well, I get around £10 to £15 for doing nothing at all,

but then if I go on a shopping trip,

my mum will just give me £20, £40, whatever.

She'll just kind of give it to me.

Mine is a little bit different. It varies a lot.

I've got a debit card. Basically, like...

ADAM AND DONNA GASP

-How old are you?

-14.

-14 and you've got a debit card.

I didn't get my first debit card until I was, like, 17.

Then just to get what went in there, I had to really go out and work for.

But there have been times when Donna and Adam

just haven't been able to make ends meet.

Donna, I know there are food banks nearby.

Is that something that you've ever had to go and use?

It is. I've used them a couple of times.

What's a food bank?

It's a place you go to when you haven't got much money

to go get a shop in.

You can apply for a couple of bags of food

from the church or an organisation.

They work so hard, but they still don't have enough.

I didn't even know what a food bank was until today.

I think it's really unfair, because it's a human right to have food.

We kind of just think, "Yeah, Britain's really good."

You don't want to think outside the bubble that you live in.

I would have thought that food is something that every household has

and not that you have to go to a place

where they can give it to you for free, you know.

I thought that was a bit shocking, you could say.

These visits have been an eye-opener for our kids

and will hopefully make them appreciate

how easy they have it at home.

It's their second day at the fish factory.

In their first three factories, golden boys Noah and Josh triumphed.

But four factories in, and one of the girls has upped her game.

Saf is going head-to-head with reigning champ Josh.

Right, guys, your task today, you're going

to be working on the grading line.

What you're going to need to be doing is emptying two sizes

from the grader in the red tubs

and you're going to be pouring them into the corresponding bins.

Josh, I'm going to give you the 10s to 12s,

Saf, I'm going to give you the 8 to 10s to do.

The frozen fish is sawn up into pieces called fillets,

and the fillets are then sorted according to size.

Josh and Saf will be responsible for emptying the different size

fish into bins for use further down the production line.

It calls for care, patience and precision,

or production will grind to a halt.

Oh, I didn't push it in far enough.

I didn't push that in far enough.

I've dropped two.

Hmm. Not a great start for butterfingers Josh.

-Sorry.

-We need to make sure that no fish goes on the floor.

It's really, really expensive, OK?

-Yeah.

-Did you drop some?

I dropped some. I dropped two, cos this didn't slide in properly.

Ordinarily, what tends to happen when somebody drops fish on the floor?

If fish falls on to the floor,

it becomes a waste product, a by-product.

This fish costs anywhere between £3.50 and £4.50 per kilo.

A by-product is worth about 20 pence.

So there's almost 100% loss to the business.

Before yesterday,

some of our lucky kids had never even heard of a food bank.

So prior to starting their shift today,

I want them to see one first-hand.

ALL: Hi.

-Come one in.

-Nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you.

This is our food larder.

It's estimated hat there are over 800 food banks across the UK,

and this year alone, over a million people have needed to use them.

A third of those are children.

Is this what you expected?

No, there's so many, like, cans and tins and everything.

Families come here to receive a food parcel

when they can't afford to feed themselves.

We don't actually have anything fresh.

We don't have fresh bread and things like that.

What kind of people do you supply food for?

Families with young children. Teenagers like yourself.

Single people.

So is it a lot of people who are in this sort of situation?

There are, Noah, yeah.

A food request has just come in from a mother and her two young children.

Noah, Kazia and Hansa are tasked with creating a package for them.

It needs to include a variety of foods and, importantly,

contain items that young children will eat.

That's a really good choice. We get asked for meatballs quite a lot.

That's it. You've got to think about them carrying it home. That's good.

Everybody likes bolognese.

-You can't go wrong with that.

-And it's got tomatoes in it as well.

-So we just need baked beans, then?

-Baked beans.

-Which are here.

I think. Yeah.

So what do our kids think of a food bank

now that they've seen one for themselves?

Not being able to provide for their family must be really hard.

It's quite sad that people actually in Britain

need to have this food bank.

It's quite upsetting, actually.

I think you've really go the idea, kids. Do you want a job?

Yeah!

I love it here, it's so nice.

Aw.

Back at the factory, Saf and Josh are sorting fish fillets into buckets.

It's Saf's chance to knock golden boy Josh off his number one spot.

Exactly the same idea.

I want you to take the 7 to 8s, put this box on that table.

-It's really heavy.

-That's OK, Saf. You'll be OK.

With two fish down, Josh can't afford to make any more mistakes.

No, Josh, that's wrong. That's wrong. This is 8 to 10, Josh.

-Put that box back.

-Oh!

I was pouring the wrong ones. I picked up the wrong box.

Second mistake that Josh has made in this task.

He managed to just about save himself, but a close call.

Saf hasn't made any mistakes whatsoever.

There's been no mistakes and there's been no fish on the floor,

-so I'm really pleased with that.

-Good news for Saf.

Four factories in and it seems Saf has gone the extra mile

to win over boss Darren.

Noah, Kazia and Hansa are now back from the food bank.

This is their final chance to impress and deliver.

-OK, are we all ready?

-Almost.

-Sorted for the factory floor?

All right, guys. I think some of us are still wearing make-up.

After everything we went through yesterday,

I'm really, really, disappointed. You're wasting my time.

So, before we proceed,

can you get the make-up off as quick as possible, please?

I'm really unhappy.

Girls, why have you come to work with make-up on again

when it was made so clear yesterday that it wasn't acceptable?

'Oh. For once, Hansa and Kazia are speechless.'

Do you want to take it off nice and quick?

Nice and quick, girls.

Guys, do you want to cut out the sniggering?

Get the make-up off, don't be rude. You're wasting my time.

OK. Sorted?

-Do you want to apologise? GIRLS:

-Sorry.

Come on, guys.

What a dismal start to the third and final task.

Hansa and Kazia will have to pull out all the stops

if they've got any chance of redeeming themselves.

OK, guys, this is going to be your third task.

You're going to be packing the sea dogs.

50 sea dogs in a box,

then you're going to be putting the box on the top of the rail.

There is no way you can get this wrong, OK?

-I'm sure we'll find a way.

-No. No. This is it.

You're going to go out with a bang.

All our five have to do is count them into boxes of 50.

But before they get going, Darren has some important news.

What we're going to do, we're going to promote Safia

and ask her to supervise production.

Make sure, tell me if anything is going wrong.

Amazing!

So another promotion for Saf.

-Well done.

-Whoo!

Safia, you look utterly shocked.

I thought it would have been Josh, not me. I'm well chuffed.

Are you feeling good?

OK, so two on the left, two on the right, Safia supervising.

Get yourselves going.

Hansa, Kazia, Josh and Noah get cracking.

Off you go. Boxes are behind you, Noah.

-OK.

-50 in a box.

OK.

But Saf seems like a fish out of water in her new role as supervisor.

I don't really know what I'm meant to be doing at the moment.

I'm kind of just standing, waiting for something to happen.

I'm not actually sure what I'm meant to do.

Back in the textile factory,

a usually super cool Noah floundered in his role as supervisor.

-Noah...

-Noah.

Noah!

Back at the fish factory, Saf's team are in need of leadership.

I can't count. I don't know when I'm... 12, 13, 14, 15, 16.

I've lost my count.

With Saf failing to give direction, the production line falters.

-They're all falling in.

-It's OK, Saf, they'll sort it.

What you need to do for me, supervise the line,

tell the other packers that's waste. Go back and tell them.

-You can do it.

-I don't want to.

I don't really want to do it though.

Guys, Darren said to speed up cos...

But Saf's orders fall on deaf ears.

What do I do now?

I don't really want to be supervisor. I mean, I'm really happy

that I got promoted, but I don't think I'm very good at it.

What are you not good at?

Talking to people. I can't tell them what to do, I'm really bad at it.

But you've never tried before, so how do you know?

I don't know, I'm just really bad at it.

-Are they doing anything wrong?

-No, they're doing it fine.

I think that's fair enough, then, but you need to not panic.

You're totally panicking and I don't know why.

I don't think she likes telling us off, cos she's a really nice person.

Keen to help their friend, Hansa and Kazia speed up.

Let them know they're doing a good job.

That's just as important as telling them they're not doing a good job.

Everyone is doing well, now, so there's time to tell them.

-OK.

-OK, come on.

Darren said you guys are working at 100%, so well done.

OK. Thank you.

The order completed, Darren calls time.

OK, guys, that's the end of the task.

Darren is going to have a look at your work, he's going to have a chat

with the other workers and you're going to all meet in the boardroom.

-Hello, hello. KIDS:

-Hello.

-How are we all?

-Good.

You know the score. You know why we're here.

First of all, I'm going to hand over to your bosses

and they're going to remind us why this factory is so important.

As we all know, Grimsby is synonymous with fish.

What we've seen over the last few days,

a lot of businesses have moved away from the fish docks,

but it's still a thriving community around the fish industry.

You guys have learnt first-hand just how precious these jobs are.

So if we could start with Hansa.

Hansa on day one, I was a bit disappointed that we had to ask

you to remove your make-up when you were coming into the food factory.

I feel it should have been done quicker and more to the point

so that it wasn't starting to waste my time.

I do agree with the thing about the make-up.

I should have just got on and done it.

But, on a real positive, Hansa, once you were on the line,

you performed really well.

Got stuck in and followed the clear instructions really well.

Kazia. How's Kazia done?

It's really a repeat of what happened with Hansa.

-Make-up to remove on day one.

-These two are like two peas in a pod.

Yeah, the same.

I mean, what we do with our troublesome staff,

should we call it, I'd normally send one staff to one end of the factory

and the other one to the other.

They'd bump into each other at the end of the shift.

But Kazia, once you're on the line performing the tasks,

-yeah, really good.

-Josh. How's Josh done?

Yeah, Josh has been good. Some small hiccups.

-We had some fish hit the floor.

-That's right.

Just made by a minor mistake on the line.

Just a little bit more attention to detail.

-So, overall, thumbs up?

-Yeah, thumbs up, yeah.

-Noah.

-Yeah, Noah is good.

Noah is a bright kid. Clearly stands out.

Little bit chatty on day one at the start,

and then today worked really well on the line.

How has Safia done?

Yeah, Safia has done really well. The way you've acted in the factory,

listening to what's been instructed and then the way you've given

the tasks a go has been really pleasing to see.

Saf, how do you feel you've done here in the fish factory?

I think I done pretty good on the first two,

but I think I completely flopped on the last one.

I wasn't a very good supervisor.

I don't know, I'm not quite sure how I've done.

See, I disagree. I think you were fine as a supervisor.

Yeah, you were good, Saf.

-You really were.

-Yeah, you were.

So we've had a conversation and there would be some that you would be

willing to offer a job were the old enough.

The guys that I would offer a job are Josh, Saf and Noah.

Josh, Saf and Noah. What do you make of that?

-Oh, I'm well chuffed.

-Shocked.

So who would you call your star employee?

I think the person that shone the most,

who was the star employee was Safia.

I think she's done really well. Over the two days, got really stuck in.

That's the first time I've ever made star employee now.

It's, like... I'm well happy.

Saf, you're the first girl to be made star employee,

and you should be very, very happy.

'At last, one of our girls has stolen the crown from the boys.'

Next time on Show Me What You're Made Of,

we're at a clothes recycling factory.

Noah puts on a show.

And the girls are far from impressed.

I don't put on these Y-fronts and go, "Look, Noah, I'm a man."