Pay for site labour in Poland has risen by about 20% in the past year, a development that is likely to lure workers in the UK back to their native country. The pay for professional staff has risen by between 10% and 20%.

The rises, revealed in an international cost comparison compiled by Gardiner & Theobald, are being driven by a buoyant construction market across a number of sectors including commercial, residential, retail and infrastructure.

“There is evidence that workers are drifting back,” says Jan Holyst in G&T’s Warsaw office. “One of the factors is that what workers were earning in euros and stirling and converting into Polish currency 12 months ago is now worth at least 10-15% less.”

Home Office statistics show that 38,680 Poles signed its register of migrant workers in the third quarter of last year, compared with 45,465 for the same period in 2006.

Romania is also experiencing a construction boom. G&T says the Bucharest market has “gone into overdrive”.