Polish workers, already a significant force in Britain’s plumbing industry, are starting to supplant Antipodeans as one the main sources of bar staff.

Spirit Group, one of Britain’s biggest pub operators with more than 1,000 hostelries and 22,000 employees, is taking on so many Poles that it has started to print training manuals in Polish.

Andrew Knight, the managing director of Spirit, which is part of Punch Taverns, estimated that in the company’s 130 pubs in London at least 20 per cent of the staff were from Eastern Europe, a large proportion of them from Poland. Mr Knight said that although the company, which owns the Chef & Brewer chain, still employed many Australians and New Zealanders, many of them were now managers and Eastern Europeans were filling many bar and kitchen roles.

He said that Poles, many of whom had started to come to Britain after their country joined the European Union in 2004, had a “fanastic work ethic”, adding: “Many of them arrive here with not very much and work hard for their money.”

He said that many began in kitchen work and, once they had learnt English, were able to work behind the bar. He said that Poles were paid on the same salary scale as their domestic counterparts.

One of the company’s longest-serving Polish employees is Ewa Kwaitowska, 28, who, nine years after coming to Britain without a single word of English, is now manager of Ye Olde London pub in the City.

“I had just left school and working in a pub kitchen was the easiest job to get here,” she said. “It’s a fun industry and the pay and standard of living are much better than in Poland. It also offers the opportunity to progress.” Ms Kwaitowska has 12 staff working under her, including three fellow Poles, one Alabanian and one Lithuanian. Oh, and three Britons.

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