Binmen have been offered a £1,200 bonus to complete their rounds.

The Argus can exclusively reveal that council staff have been offered a “productivity payment”

which they will only receive if they complete their rounds.

This comes after Brighton and Hove City Council made a raft of cost-cutting changes to its refuse and recycling service in October, including scrapping two refuse and three recycling rounds.

Cityclean workers claimed the changes were impractical and as a result thousands of householders have faced disruptions to their collections.

It is understood the payment has been offered in an effort to “bed in” the new system.

Town hall bosses said it was allowed to reflect the “extra effort being made by our staff”.

Mark Turner, of the GMB, said: “This is a practice the council has done for many years and they will continue to do it.

“It’s not unusual across the council following a reorganisation of a service.”

The news comes after a bitter battle between Cityclean and senior management as the local authority revamped its system of pay to make it “fairer and more consistent”.

Following a six day strike, an agreement wasstruck which saw refuse and recycling staff agree to work harder to keep their take home pay.

The Argus understands as part of that deal, extra payments of £130 would be awarded to those who voluntarily worked Saturdays in the run up to Christmas. Sources added the extra £1,200 sum will not be fully paid until March.

Labour councillor Gill Mitchell said: “I am very surprised to hear that the Green council is offering special payments to Cityclean staff after expecting residents to endure what was clearly an unnecessary refuse strike in the interest of pay harmonisation.”

“Council leader Jason Kitcat has a lot of explaining to do.”

A council spokesman said: “The reorganisation of rounds at Cityclean is the biggest and most complex change for the service for many years.

“It involves a reduction of vehicles to achieve efficiencies together with the introduction of new working practices that are unique within the council.

“We always recognised that bringing in such a significant change was going to be challenging and would take some time to settle in and we are committed to maintaining good workplace relations during this period.

“We know that not all the rounds are working as well as we would like and we are continuing to encourage and listen to feedback from residents and our workforce at Cityclean to help us improve the running of the rounds.”