It's another early start for workers at the Premier Foods factory in Carlton, Barnsley.
A dozen arms flank the factory’s newest machine, ready to pack hundreds of Mr Kipling cakes into boxes.
Today it’s Angel slices. Tomorrow it could be caramel. But the action is always the same. Pick, place, move. Pick, place, move.
Darren Raine, operations manager, has the job of surveying it all. “Some of them work harder than others,” he shouts across the factory floor. “It’s mainly those on the beginning and middle of the production line. They don’t get any more money, though.”
In fact they don’t get paid any money at all. Mr Raine isn’t talking about his human workers. These arms belong to a robot.
Up to one thousand Angel slices roll off the production line every minute. It is mesmerising to watch. Each arm decides which slice to take, the tray to put it in and where to move next, all faster than you can say “exceedingly good cakes”.
Humans are only needed to feed the machine and clean up, supplying new packaging, clearing away excess plastic wrap and removing any less than perfect cakes, to be sold in the staff shop.
Automation has become an increasingly common sight at Britain’s factories. But does this mean humans are destined for the scrap heap?
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