Cathy Come Home (played by Carol White) and Reg (Ray Brooks), and their descent into poverty and homelessness. At the start of the film, Cathy leaves her parents' overcrowded rural home and hitchhikes to the city, where she finds work and meets Reg, a well-paid lorry driver. They fall in love, marry, and rent a modern flat in a building that does not allow children. Cathy soon becomes pregnant and must stop working, and Reg is injured on the job and becomes unemployed. The loss of income and birth of the baby force them to leave their flat, and they are unable to
Ken Loach British directors to use swearing in his films. Mary Whitehouse complained about swearing in "Cathy Come Home" and "Up The Junction", while "The Big Flame" (1969) for the BBC was an early instance of the word "shit", and the certificate to "Kes" caused some debate owing to the profanity, but these films have relatively few swear words compared to his later work. In particular, the film "Sweet Sixteen" was awarded an 18 certificate on the basis of the very large amount of swearing, despite the lack of serious violence or sexual content, which led Loach to encourage under-18s to break