How Brexit helped Poland become a European superpower

Telegraph

a day ago

For Natalia Muszynska, the daughter of a Polish supermarket worker in Scotland, the journey home began with an internet search.
Despite studying business management at college in Aberdeen, she was finding it almost impossible to line up an internship. Then inspiration struck.
'I switched to a Polish advertising site, typed in 'internships', and thousands of options came up, including paid ones,' said Ms Muszynska, who moved to Britain with her mother shortly after Poland joined the EU in 2004, along with around a million other Poles seeking higher wages in the UK.
Curious about whether life in Poland now had more to offer, she relocated to Warsaw, joining hundreds of thousands of Poles who have moved back to their home country as it emerges on the world stage as an economic juggernaut and Slavic superpower.
After decades of suffering under communism, its economy is booming. It boasts a bigger army than Britain, France or Germany, and Donald Tusk, its centrist prime minister, is a former EU Council president who wields immense influence in Brussels.
At the same time, a metro ticket costs as little as 60p, a pint of beer will set you back less than £3, and the overall cost of living remains low in European league tables.
Britain – or perhaps, the decline of Britain, in the eyes of some Poles – has played a role in this success story. The number of Poles in the UK has fallen from a peak of around a million to 700,000 in the wake of Brexit, and Poland is reaping the reward.
Ms Muszynska says she is a 'prime example of this'. Not long after returning home, she started her own property business and was living in a flat with underfloor heating that she could only dream of having in Aberdeen.
'There are so many opportunities here – it's the fastest growing place in Europe,' she said. 'My mum moved to the UK because she couldn't find a job in Poland. I came back to Poland because I thought: this is the biggest opportunity ever.'
This Sunday, Poles face a choice that will define their country's place in Europe as they head to the polls for presidential elections. Rafal Trzaskowski, the liberal mayor of Warsaw and Mr Tusk's preferred candidate, is in a neck-and-neck race with the hardline conservative Karol Nawrocki.
Experts say membership of the European Union is by far the biggest contributor to the country's triumph, opening up free movement for Polish workers across the continent and full access to the EU's lucrative single market.
Since joining the bloc in 2004, the country is yet to experience recession, excluding a blip at the height of the Covid pandemic, while GDP has risen by four per cent on average each year. This year alone, a 3.3 per cent increase in GDP is expected, compared to just one per cent in the UK.
But with hundreds of thousands of young workers being lured back by the promise of a better life, Poland has also benefited from Britain's struggles.
Aleks Szczerbiak, a Polish politics expert and professor at Sussex University, said the return of Poles could also be linked to a sense that 2004's mass exodus was doing more harm than good in the long run.
'Access to western labour markets was one of the reasons EU membership was, and still is, so popular,' he said. 'But that quickly went from being the greatest achievement to being seen as a kind of sign of failure. Poles felt that in order to earn a decent salary they had to go abroad, and work at a level way below their qualifications.
'You had Poles with PhDs serving coffee in Starbucks because it paid more in the UK than Poland, and so there has been an effort to get people back.'
After two decades of EU free movement, the Polish government is posting adverts online urging citizens to return home: 'New Year's resolution to make: come back to Poland!' states one recent advert, which promises 'a flourishing economy, attractive salaries and a safe environment'.
One of the main draws is Warsaw itself, a city of 1.8 million people where skyscrapers, tech start-ups and trendy cafes serving French toast have replaced the old, urban sprawl of Soviet buildings.
Warsaw's most famous landmark used to be the Palace of Culture and Science, an imposing high-rise built in the Stalinist style in 1955. After the fall of Communism in 1989, its dedications to Stalin were scrubbed from the colonnade and lobby, while a new skyscraper – Varso Tower, the tallest in the EU – now rises above the city.
Middle-class neighbourhoods are also springing up in Warsaw, offering a Slavic version of Notting Hill or Knightsbridge to successful Poles heeding the government's call to return home.
In Zoliborz, northern Warsaw, gleaming white new-build apartment blocks have risen over flagstone courtyards and water fountains, with flat prices ranging from 600,000 to 1.9 million Polish zloty (£120,000-£375,000). BMWs fill many parking spaces.
Robert, a construction firm owner and resident of Zoliborz, described the transition of Warsaw over the past two decades as 'shocking to witness'.
'Our parents had, let's say, a mid-range quality of life, but we are an extremely hard-working nation and we have earned what we have now,' he said. 'You can see that we're building a lot in Warsaw, and there is more to do.'
Robert, 35, who did not wish to share his last name, added that when he started his construction firm a decade ago, he struggled to find workers – they had all moved to Britain and Germany. Now the reverse is the case – he is the one taking phone calls from Poles who have returned and are seeking work from him.
'And when the Germans visit, they are impressed by the phone signal,' he jokes, alluding to Berlin's outdated telecoms infrastructure.
The famously fierce Polish work ethic still has its admirers in Britain, such as Daniel Kawczynski, the former Conservative MP, who viewed Brexit as an opportunity to deepen British-Polish relations.
'I remember going back to Poland in 1983, when martial law was lifted, to see my beloved grandfather,' said Mr Kawczynski, who was born in Warsaw and served as the MP for Shrewsbury and Atcham from 2005 to 2024.
'At that time there was nothing in the shops, petrol was rationed and the Communist system was politically Orwellian and economically illiterate. Now Poland is set to overtake the United Kingdom as an economy, and it's down to the fundamental principle that Polish people are driven to work hard, as hard as they can, and put into the system.'
Fierce Ukrainian ally
No account of Poland's rise can overlook the moment when Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine on Feb 24 2022. Poland immediately opened its border to nine million refugees, and that was only the beginning of its support for Kyiv.
When Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, told Western allies, 'I don't need a ride [out of Ukraine] – I need ammunition,' Poland was among the first to step forward.
To date, Poland has provided 47 military support packages to Kyiv's forces, ranging from hundreds of T-72 tanks and infantry fighting vehicles, to combat helicopters, artillery systems and vast amounts of ammunition.
Whichever candidate is elected, Poland's role as a leading EU supporter of Ukraine is set to continue, due to widespread public support for arming Kyiv against Russian invaders.
But the invasion also prompted massive rearmament of Poland's own armed forces: Poland's annual defence spending stood at 2.7 per cent of GDP in 2022 but is set to reach 4.7 per cent later this year – tantalisingly close to the new 5 per cent Nato target, which prior to Putin's invasion was considered a mere pipe dream.
That rapid increase of military spending began under the Right-wing Law and Justice leader Mateusz Morawiecki, and continues under Mr Tusk, who came to power in 2023, in a country where there is near-universal consensus for giving significant military support to Ukraine.
That sentiment is largely fuelled by geography, with Poland sharing a long border with both Ukraine and close Putin ally Belarus, but also by a historical revulsion towards Russian authoritarianism.
Mr Tusk himself is a former president of the European Council of EU national leaders in Brussels. His critics in Poland, who tend to be Eurosceptic, though not to the extent of wanting to see a 'Polexit,' say this makes him too close to the Brussels elite – perhaps so close that he no longer represents Polish national interests.
Declining birth rates
But Mr Tusk's supporters argue that this deep knowledge of the EU and its institutions makes him the right leader to hold maximum leverage over the bloc, particularly when it comes to contentious issues such as mass migration or farming subsidies.
Not everyone in Poland feels comfortable with its nascent superpower status, as reflected in an Economist editorial this week hailing its 'remarkable rise'.
One Polish industry source, who did not wish to be named, said that behind the effusive headlines about his country there lurked deep concerns about the economic future.
They cited as one example the significant decline in birth rates since 2017, from 1.48 to 1.26, as a sign that there could be a missing generation of workers in two decades.
There are also concerns on the Eurosceptic wings of Polish politics that too much sovereignty has been ceded to Brussels.
Poland – which since joining the EU in 2004 has received €246 billion (£200 billion) from the EU budget – is set to become a net contributor to that budget in future, rather than a recipient.
That could create a dynamic where Poles feel they are putting far more value into the EU than what they receive in return, similar to sentiment in pre-Brexit Britain and in Germany, the biggest net contributor to EU funds.
'You can't really say everything is perfect when nearly half the country is set to vote for Karol Nawrocki', the Polish industry source said, referring to the Right-wing, Trump-esque candidate in Sunday's presidential elections.
Opinion polls suggest the result will be extremely close, with 46 per cent backing Mr Nawrocki against 47 per cent for Mr Trzaskowski.
Beyond economics, politics and the military, Poland is also gaining significant soft power in the arts world. The fantasy role-playing video game The Witcher 3, one of the most critically acclaimed and lucrative worldwide, was developed in Warsaw.
The fame of CD Projekt Red, the studio behind The Witcher 3, is so widespread that fans travel from across the world to pay homage at its offices, tucked away on an industrial estate in the north-east of the capital.
Inside, a statue of The Witcher's silver-haired protagonist, Geralt of Rivia, greets visitors who have flown in to experience the country that produced their favourite video game.
'It's amazing to see fans from around the world come to Warsaw just to visit our studio,' said Jan Rosner, its vice-president of business development. 'The fact that our office has become a destination for them is a testament to the passion our community brings. It truly means the world to us.'
The $5.1 billion studio is now working on a sequel, The Witcher 4, already one of the most hotly anticipated game releases worldwide.
And the games have also raised the profile of Polish culture, as they are based on local folklore and the fantasy novels of Andrzej Sapkowski, the Polish author, who was virtually unknown outside of the country prior to the release of The Witcher 3. Now he is widely considered as the Slavic successor to JRR Tolkien.
As a result, the studio is among the most striking examples of Poland's rise on the world stage.
Two decades ago, when Poland joined the EU, some young Britons would have moaned that the plumbers of Poland were taking their jobs. Now they are getting on planes to Warsaw so they can pose for selfies with a statue of a Polish monster-slayer.