The flyer came through the door a couple of weeks ago. "Are you looking for someone to paint your house? You have found the right people! We are a team of Professional Polish Workers who can cheaply and solidly paint." It went on: "We also provide high quality tiling services."

The phrase "Professional Polish Workers" was highlighted in bold typeface. There are two reasons why tradespeople would highlight their Polish nationality. In the first instance, over the last five years, Polish tradespeople have gained an excellent reputation in the workplace. They are not afraid of work and the combination of enthusiasm and skills generally provide a very satisfactory service. Like generations of Irish exiles before them, they use the hunger of the immigrant to push themselves on.

There is nothing unique about Poles. Immigrants from other eastern European states within the EU are similarly commended, but Poles are identified by sheer force of numbers. The other reason is cost. Through the bubble years, when the home-improvement market went through the roof, workers from the new EU states provided their trades at very competitive prices.

Work was plentiful. Many Irish tradespeople sniffed a market in which they could charge exorbitantly, and did so. Canny immigrants realised they could do the job profitably at lesser prices and exploited the fertile territory abandoned by the native boys. Everybody got a slice of the action.

Not any more. The work has dried up. Prices have come down, and everybody is flailing around in the same shrinking pool. In such an environment, tensions are going to rise and the grind of history has taught us that these tensions will inevitably be wrapped up in race.

All the indications are that large numbers who came here when work was plentiful are now staying on. As of last December, 44,600 of those signing on were immigrants, representing about one fifth of the total unemployed. A report in the Irish Times last Monday from a Polish church in Dublin confirmed that many have decided to stay on and see out the bad times.

Immigration is a highly mobile business these days with cheap air travel, but at the moment there is nowhere else to go. In any event, many who came here liked what they saw and have decided to nest. For parents of young children, or those at the foothills of family life, moving abroad again to the next job has added complications.

Handling this new reality is going to be no easy task. If our friends the Polish painters hoover up scarce work on the basis of cheaper pricing, their unemployed Irish counterparts will locate a vent in which to pour frustrations. The plight of PAYE workers is another concern. Through the boom years, employers sang loudly about the benefits immigrants were bringing to the country, principally cheap labour. There were cases of gross exploitation, ranging from mushroom pickers to construction workers. Now the market has turned and the employers hold all the aces. Inevitably, some will see the current economic distress as an opportunity. If the few jobs on offer end up being filled by immigrants, suspicions about pay levels and conditions will immediately arise. This sort of thing has already become a feature of the recession in the UK. Italian and Portugese unskilled workers have been imported to construct a power station in Lindsey oil refinery in Lincolnshire, prompting a series of wildcat strikes. The GMB trade union in the UK is claiming that two energy plants and an oil refinery are refusing to employ British workers.

Scarcity of resources is another area that will provide a flashpoint of tension. Currently, there is talk of cuts to social-welfare payments. If such a horrendous vista comes to pass, those at the receiving end will look around for somebody to blame.

It would be nice to believe that dear old Ireland will be able to keep tensions under wraps. However, if recent events have shown anything, it is that history keeps coming back to haunt just when you thought it had been dispatched once and for all. Leadership and tolerance are going to be at a premium to deal with what is coming down the line. Employers groups and trade unions need to provide direction and vision. Both have been to the fore in usurping the job of governing through the partnership process, but this is an issue in which they could make a real contribution to society.

Leadership in the political sphere will also be vital, but don't hold your breath. With Fianna Fáil plunging in the polls, expect some of the more nervous nellies to exploit rather than attempt to defuse racial tensions. Noel O'Flynn has already been fast out of the blocks, publishing parliamentary questions he set down on permits for foreign workers. He's letting the frustrated element in his constituency know where he stands on the matter of Johnny Foreigner.

Some on the wilder shores of Fine Gael have a habit of drawing a few kicks at Travellers, and these politicians also can be expected to make hay on the back of racial vulnerabilities.

It's not going to be pretty, but in the coming years we're going to find out a lot about ourselves, and our capacity for tolerance when the chips are down.