A British recruitment company that supplied more than 200 immigrant workers to pick flowers in Scotland has lost its licence after an investigation found that it was involved in forced labour and intimidation.

The workers - mostly Poles - were paid as little as 4p per bunch of daffodils, amounting to £24 for a nine-hour day, by Timberland Recruitment Ltd, based in Suffolk.

They were told that if they tried to leave before the end of the contract they would have to give the company £700. If they were unable to provide the money their families in their home countries would have to pay instead, according to the investigation carried out by the Gangmasters Licensing Authority (GLA).

Timberland supplied workers to Grampian Growers, a co-operative based at Montrose, in Angus, and Winchester Growers in Cornwall.

John Beckson, the company's director, has now had his licence revoked by the GLA. Timberland has also been reported to the human trafficking centre, a dedicated police unit based in Sheffield. The GLA emphasised that Grampian Growers and Winchester Growers were not under investigation and had provided full cooperation. Paul Whitehouse, the GLA's chairman, said: “Forced labour, intimidation and abuse at work is something nobody should experience but we are uncovering it too frequently.”

The investigation by the GLA began when seven workers in Angus complained about their poor accommodation. They were housed in converted farm buildings at Carmyllie, where as many as eight people slept in one room with only three bunk beds.

Others, up to five at a time, shared caravans and chalets in Blairgowrie.The GLA's investigators also discovered that Timberland used uncertified minibuses to move workers between Cornwall and Scotland, and took unauthorised deductions from their wages to pay for protective clothing, accommodation and transport. Mark Clark, managing director of Grampian Growers, said yesterday that he had not been aware of the problems. He said: “We pay £5.52 per hour and £6.52 for overtime. We submit the hours worked to Timberland and they pay workers the following week. Like the GLA, we did our own audit and were 100 per cent satisfied by it. Workers were being paid a fair wage and living in a decent standard of accommodation in caravans and chalets in Blairgowrie that you would be happy to stay in on a holiday.”

The GLA was established after the deaths of 23 Chinese cocklepickers at Morecambe Bay in 2004. The authority has worked to regulate the casual labour market by awarding licences to firms employing foreign workers, but the dark side of the human trafficking was underlined last month when the severed head of Jolanta Bledaite, a Lithuanian woman, was found on a beach in Arbroath. The 35-year-old, who had worked in local farms, went to Scotland to find a better way of life.

One worker, Krizysztof Popoczny, 22, from Poland, worked at Winchester Growers in Cornwall for six weeks before working for two weeks with Grampian Growers in Scotland. He said: “We had two contracts: one paid us for the amount of flowers we picked, and the other paid us an hourly rate of £5.52, but we never received that. I made £800 for my two months of work, but I thought I was going to earn double that.”

Mr Beckson said he would appeal against the GLA's decision.

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