Lubbers helping with the cleaning (5)

I believe the answer is:

swabs

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'lubbers' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are plural nouns, I don't see how one could define the other.

'helping with the cleaning' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'with' could be 'w' (short for with) and 'w' is located in the answer.
The remaining letters 'sabs' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't see.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

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