Ladies Who Do (1963)

Mrs. Cragg works as a part-time domestic for retired Colonel Whitforth and as a cleaner at an office block in London. It is whilst doing her city cleaning that she retrieves a half smoked cigar as a gift for the Colonel and unwittingly wraps it in a scrap of paper discarded by a property financier named James Ryder .

On receiving his cigar, the Colonel discovers that the scrap of paper actually contains details of a city takeover bid and unscrupulously uses this insider information to make £5000 on the stock market, which he shares with Mrs Cragg. This new-found wealth prompts the pair, together with three other ‘chars’ who are Mrs Cragg's neighbours in Pitt Street, to form the company 'Ladezudu': a speculation syndicate headed by Whitforth with the ladies providing insider information collected from bins at their respective offices. All is going well until an ill-timed investment in Irish pigs wipes out all their capital as swine fever kills their stock.

It is then that Mrs Cragg discovers that Ryder is planning the demolition and redevelopment of Pitt Street. As the bulldozers arrive and no assets to assist them, can the 'ladies who do' save their street and take on the city executives single handly?