There is a story about chain of 2 food shops in the town somewhere in Ireland. The boss employs only Polish people who are living together above one of the shops in the apartment rent by the boss. Everybody say that the boss is a nice man, but they don’t talk with him often. Polish people work in those shops 6 days per week, usually 10 - 11 hours per day and they are supervised by Polish girl, who is - as they say - horrible person and reminds them kind of a work camp guard. Sometimes one or two of the Poles are waken up during the night and they are to go to the shop (shop itself is closed, but there is plenty of work in the store house). Sometimes it is 2 hours in the middle of the night and on 8 am the same people have to start work in the shop downstairs. During the day they have to work hard under the watch eye of the Polish girl - the supervisor. There is no overtimes pay, and for 10 - 11 h/day 6 day/week they get 320 - 340 Euro. Moreover, on their payslips they see numbers like 400 Euro or more. They have to agree to that or to go away and loose their jobs. They can’t say anything to the boss or to the Polish supervisor, because the answer is always the same: “if you don’t like that job then go away”. Of course, Polish employees don’t speak proper English, and they are afraid the situation being out of work and starting from the beginning again, but usually after couple of months they decide to quit and then the boss can easily find another unemployed Poles. Irish boss is nice, and he pretends that everything is OK, that he likes his Polish employees and appreciates their work. In the same way he pretend that all food being sold in his shops is made in Ireland. In the pub his Polish employees (both former and present) tell the stories how they are wiping out from the food stamps of Brazil or other countries.
The number of Poles in Ireland is very high, and the percentage of non English speakers among them is also very high. Some of the Irish employers use it. They know, Polish person who don’t speak English won’t be able to fight for his or her rights and since he or she is struggling to get any job, won’t complain. Thus some of the Irish employers pay wages much lower that the minimal wage determined by the Irish law, forcing them to work overtime and 6 days a week. Those employers will never employ any Irish person, because Irish employee will stand up and fight for his or her right or at least quit the job very fast saying to the boss “feck off ya bastard” or something like that.
Problem of exploitation can rise and can cause anti Polish behaviour among some Irish, since the bosses prefer to employ cheap Poles who can be exploited very easily, and thus they are “stealing Irish jobs”.
The story I described above is very well known in one town, and I have heard it from at least 5 people who used to work or who are still working in one of those shops.
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