Cast your mind back to the first national lockdown, what now feels like a thousand years ago, and you’ll remember the debate that was ‘should you still have a cleaner come round in a pandemic?’. At the time, Grazia spoke to cleaners at the centre of the conversation, some of whom felt safe as long as guidelines were followed while others were terrified to go back to work. Now, the question has been raised again but intriguingly, not on social media… on Google.
‘Can a cleaner work in new lockdown?’ is currently a breakout search term on Google with everyone seeking information about the new lockdown rules. It seems that while tensions have settled on Twitter about the rules (and morals) of having someone come into your home to clean, cleaners and those who require them are still eager to know if they can work.
Can cleaners work in new lockdown?
For your information then, they can.
'Where it is necessary for you to work in other people’s homes - for example, for nannies, cleaners or tradespeople - you can do so,' government guidance reads. 'Otherwise, you should avoid meeting for work in a private home or garden, where COVID-19 Secure measures may not be in place.'
‘The risk of transmission can be substantially reduced if Covid-19 secure guidelines are followed closely,’ the guidance continues. ‘Extra consideration should be given to those people at higher risk.’
You can find out more about Covid-secure guidelines here.
The question is then, as it was before, should cleaners – specifically domestic cleaners - work during lockdown? ‘If you are a middle-class professional who has a cleaner, you should be paying them their wages as normal and letting them stay at home,’ journalist Owen Jones tweeted when the debate first erupted. ‘If you ask them to come and clean your home, you are a monumentally selfish person and that's really all there is to it.’
As the second wave of coronavirus exceeds the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) worst case scenario, it’s imperative we treat lockdown as strictly as we did before. Not only did we have chaotic mixing at Christmas, but the new variant means transmission rates are higher than ever. However, after a Summer of managing our own risk and the hope of the vaccine being rolled out, there’s no denying attitudes have relaxed somewhat even as we enter lockdown three.
I was so anxious at the beginning of lockdown but now I’m used to it.
For some cleaners, that’s important after losing their income first time around. ‘Within the first 24 hours of lockdown [one] my job and my income vanished overnight,’ Louise, a self-employed cleaner told Grazia in May. ‘It has only just started to trickle back, thankfully. At first, I felt scared about the prospect of going into people’s safe havens. But once fully masked and gloved up, adhering to two metres social distancing, I feel fine and confident.’
Abi, who was terrified to go back to work as a cleaner in a train station is also just desperate for work. ‘I was so anxious at the beginning of lockdown but now I feel like I’m used to dealing with it and I know what I’m doing at work,’ she says. ‘I’d happily take any cleaning job that comes my way if it means having a regular income again.’
But for others, there will no doubt be cautious seeing how quickly the new variant spread particularly in London. This often female-dominated profession is filled with women putting their lives at risk to provide for their families in dire straits. It stands to reason then that anyone who can afford to employ a cleaner should think empathetically about the battle they will be facing in weighing up the risk to their health and struggling finances. Paying someone without them doing the work might have been unthinkable this time last year, but in 2021, empathy is very much what we all need to get through.
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'I Don't Feel Safe': Five Cleaners On What It's Been Like Returning To Work