In early December Rafal Gorski returned to his home country, Poland, planning never to return to Scotland.

The racist insults and harassments, the taunts of “F***ing Polish – go back to Poland”, threats of violence and attacks on his family home were so bad he couldn’t deal with the stress of life here anymore. He feared that he’d suffer the same fate as a friend – killed in a stabbing in Glasgow by a man who afterwards boasted that he’d taken the life of a “daft Pole”.

The real name and identity of the Gorskis has been changed as a neighbour, who allegedly took part in the abuse of the Polish family, has just been charged with racially aggravated offences and is now on bail, forbidden from contacting the Gorskis or entering the street where they live. Gorski’s wife, Ilona, remains in Scotland, scared to go out on her own, but committed to staying as she wants her teenage son, Jakub, to complete his education in Scotland.

The neighbours who abused her called her a “Polish dog” and told her they would “send her family back to Poland in a box”. Jakub always checks to see if there is anyone in the street before he leaves the house.

The Gorskis are not alone. Poles and other Eastern Europeans are experiencing a rising tide of racist abuse and violence. The Federation of Poles in Great Britain says there has been an annual 20% rise in racist incidents.

Two months ago, in Inverness, graffiti was found scrawled on a bridge: “Polish c**ts, get out of Scotland!” Police statistics show reports of hate crimes against “other white” people – the category Eastern Europeans fall into – have risen fivefold in Scotland in recent years. A 2008 study by Northern Constabulary found there was increased racial tensions in the Highlands and Eastern Europeans were among the most frequent targets. All in all, for families like the Gorskis, who live in a housing scheme in a tough area of Glasgow, Scotland has started to seem less like the welcoming place it first appeared.

The Gorskis were happy here until two months ago when a new family moved into their council block and tensions started. Though the Gorskis say they were always polite to their neighbours, the abuse quickly began: a barrage of racist insults, a raised finger, filthy water poured on their balcony, the breaking of their satellite dish, and then threats of physical violence.

Iain Chisholm, from the the immigrant housing charity Positive Action in Housing, recalls the story of one family from North Lanarkshire who were consistently harassed in the neighbourhood and whose son was badly bullied at school. In the end they moved to England.

Last year, in Aberdeen, there was a 57% rise in racist incidents recorded by the police. The biggest group of victims were Africans, closely followed by Eastern Europeans. This accords with research by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights which found that across the continent Central and Eastern Europeans are among the main victims of discrimination.

In Edinburgh last year, a spate of hate-filled graffiti told the city’s Poles to go home or stop stealing jobs. In Leith, where the Polish population is high, Anna Brudnowska, 28, and Ewa Aromanowicz, 31 were driven to give up the lease on their bar, following a plague of racist calls and a campaign of hate waged by a local couple.

Since they were no longer making any money, they gave up their lease in September, after 18 months. They now successfully run two bars in the centre of Edinburgh.

For Brudnowska there seems to be a clear link between the racism she experienced and the beleagured economy, however to blame the last wave of migrants for loss of jobs, as Brudnowska points out, is a simplistic way of looking at things: “The couple who attacked us said we were stealing local people’s jobs. But I employ 10 people, so I’m not stealing anyone’s job. I’m creating jobs.”