A year-and-a-half ago Mr Grey gambled his job as a builder to set up on his own.

They've closed the pits down...and it's just got worse

Colin Grey

But within a year, his dreams of self employment collapsed. With strong local competition and mounting overhead costs he decided he could not afford to carry on.

"The work just went quiet, " he said.

"It started to get harder to find work so I had to give it up in the end because I couldn't afford to live."

So now the Greys and their children - Kelly,15, Simon, 12 and Jasmine, four, rely on Susan's income of about �70 a week and added benefits to get by.

Susan Grey supports the family

Getting back into the work market has been a struggle.

When her older two children started school she took a job as a cleaner but soon found that she was working long hours for very little money.

"It was before the minimum wage came in and I was hardly earning anything at all, " said Susan.

Since then she has retrained and enjoys her job but for Susan that is not the end of her career.

She is now training to be a bookkeeper so she can eventually help her husband in a new venture which he is just starting up.

In a small unit in Cwm Business Park just outside Ebbw Vale, Colin works into the night trying get his new business off the ground.

The Greys are in the process of setting up a mouldings company which will make glass reinforced plastic surrounds for fireplaces and graves.

The machinery for the initiative has been bought by the Valleys-based employment support group Working Links, which gives people practical help to get back to work.

The steelworks is set to close this summer

Colin has also been given training in business management from the Welsh Development Agency.

"It's been stressful with the preparation work and forms to fill in," he said.

Despite their determination the Greys also have a fear of failure, with the imminent closure of the steelworks.

Susan said that the buying power which was in the town when they started the venture could soon be moving elsewhere leaving them with no market to sell their goods.

"It's taking a big chance now. When we went into the scheme the steelworks were OK.

"Now they're closing and money is tight everywhere," she said.

But whatever the outcome of their latest venture Susan Grey said there is no way that they would leave the Valleys.