As regular readers will know I try and make a point of visiting local businesses both to find out how things are at the ‘coalface’ and to give local employers the chance to tell me at first hand of any problems they have.One of most recent visits took me back to a company who are the biggest private sector employer in my constituency – O2 who have a customer care centre on Dumers Lane. I have visited the site several times before and I am always given a warm welcome and I always come away impressed at how determined the Company is to provide the best customer service possible. The development of mobile telephones over the years means that when customers ring up their queries are much more complex than they used to be. Whereas at one time callers might want advice on how to change their ringtone or update their billing details nowadays, as mobiles phones have become effectively mini-computers the person who answers the customers call is expected to be able to handle any number of different queries across hundreds of different handsets.
Not only do O2 take extra care to look after their customers they also go out of their way to look after their staff. Not only Take care of their customers and their staff they take a special interest in helping the local community through their Think Big project.
As part of my recent visit to O2 I met with their Think Big Team who explained some of the many projects they have been involved with in the past year and they are fizzing with ideas for the future. Check out the Think Big website here.
www.o2thinkbig.co.uk
David Nuttall 
David
Thank you for the response. My comment was really a pseudo-question, a sort of written rhetorical question, intended as a statement to encourage reflection. I shall explain.
Firstly, what prompted me was your use of ‘coalface’ as an idiom for ‘the frontline, where the action is’, in the context of a piece about finding out how things stand in the world of work/employment. It struck me that ‘coalface’ has not really been an appropriate idiom for ‘where the action is’ with regard to employment since 6th March 1984 and the National Coal Board announcement of its intention to close twenty coal mines with the loss of twenty thousand jobs and the subsequent loss of the primary source of employment for many communities.
Secondly, I used the word ‘striking’ as an allusion to the 1984-85 miners’ strike, the subsequent economic hardships and the ten deaths that resulted from actions around the strike.
Thirdly, the closure of the pits and the defeat of the miners strike are generally regarded as ideological victories for the Conservative Party but are still the subject of some controversy and the cause of much subsequent bitterness and enduring socio-economic hardship in many former mining communities.
6thearl
… how thinks (sic) are at the ‘coalface’ …
A striking choice of word for a Conservative MP?
Thank-you for your comment. I have corrected the typo.
I am not sure what you mean by your question. You have to bear in mind I grew up and spent most of my life in the mining communities of South Yorkshire. The coalface is a term used to describe the frontline, where the action is.
David