The Cleaner's Tale
Published on Thursday, 17th September 2020
Morag knows that the now permanent efficiency drive that suffuses all aspects of work in Facilities and Services means her job is increasingly precarious. Since the last pandemic, the university (like so many others) replaced almost all its cleaning staff with Domesti-bots, Morag is the only human cleaner in the 10 buildings she is allocated to. The buildings are now mostly under-utilized, as academics and students alike are required to work remotely when they can. She spends her shifts obeying the alerts that the logistics software sends to the small screen that dangles from her lanyard, moving from one Domesti-bot to another to top up oil levels, replace polishing pads or empty dust-bags as directed. Other, wealthier universities have contracts with the Domesti-bot suppliers that include maintenance-bots, making the likes of Morag redundant. Her employers have made their calculations and determined that as long as Morag is willing to work for less than the Living Wage, she is the cheaper (and therefore more efficient) option. Morag moves quickly to the location of her next task, aware that her rate of work is being closely monitored.
As Morag approaches her next destination she hears the sounds of some kind of scuffle. She’s usually alone in the building at this time of day. The sounds become increasingly frantic; she can hear both the mechanical clanking and whirring of the Domesti-bot and the raised, taut voice of a human. As she enters the already-lit corridor to her left, she sees an adult male with dark hair, pressed back hard against the wall, faced contorted with fear. The Domesti-bot appears to have him cornered. Morag feels the buzz of a new alert on her screen – she looks at it and sees the warning to stand clear and wait for Security to arrive.
Morag steps back a little but tries to calm the man, talking to him in soothing tones. She knows from past experience that she doesn’t have much time, but if she can persuade him to breathe deeply and lower his heart rate, the Domesti-bot’s emotional recognition algorithm will register the changes and perhaps reduce the severity of the consequences for the man. It’s not the first time she’s seen the mental unravelling of an academic – many of them seemed to be unbalanced by impact of the compulsory social distancing measures on the communal life of the university, and when they were allowed on campus, the eerie quiet and emptiness could trigger a full-scale meltdown.
Two uniformed figures rounded the corner and Morag gave up on her attempts to calm the man. She had already taken too much of a risk even by speaking to him in the otherwise empty corridor. The guards scanned her, logging her identity without a sound, then turned to the man and the Domesti-bot. One took out a needle-gun that Morag knew would administer a powerful sedative, allowing them to easily transfer the man to the Staff Wellbeing Centre, where he would undergo Resilience Assessment. She doubted she would see him on Campus again.