Birmingham City Council binmen were offered a staggering £30 an hour to clear Birmingham’s rubbish mountain.... and still refused to work.

Bosses proposed triple-time wages in an effort to entice crews into turning out on the three Christmas and the New Year bank holidays.

The deal would have put £800 in the pockets of each of the 480 city binmen, while enabling thousands of sacks littering the streets to be removed. But the offer – equivalent to £1,100 for a full a week – was turned down flat without being put to a vote.

Gerard Coyne, Regional Secretary for the Unite union, said there was no chance of workers breaking an ongoing work to rule in return for a one-off payment.

Mr Coyne added: “Bosses went round the yards saying to people ‘if you want to work the bank holidays we will pay you triple time’.

“No one took up the offer.

“The council seems to forget that we are in dispute with them. Our members have decided, quite legally, to withdraw goodwill as a consequence of being in industrial action.