Why many Free Polish personnel remained in Britain

Did the British government force Free Polish service personnel to return to Poland after the war?

Not in most cases; enforcement was weak, and many Free Poles chose emigration or settlement in Britain rather than return.

Britain's effort to return Free Polish personnel to postwar Poland was weakly enforced rather than comprehensive. Many chose emigration or continued residence in Britain instead. One personal example concerns Polish neighbours who had fought during the war and then made their lives in Britain. The wider constraint was public exhaustion: as after the First World War, there was little popular will to continue fighting in order to settle an unresolved political problem.