Big Brother troublemaker Kitten used to help troubled teenagers as a youth worker.

Kathryn "Kitten" Pinder, from Brighton, revealed on the Friends Reunited web site she worked with teenage help organisation Connexions.

The job involves supporting troubled 13 to 19-year-olds through their problems.

Connexions, which has offices in Queen's Road, Brighton, would not confirm Kitten worked for the company.

Spokeswoman Mona Walsh said: "Connexions Sussex does not disclose information regarding our employees, past and present, unless it is a request for an employment reference, which can only be given with the person's consent."

A spokeswoman for Brighton and Hove City Council, which works in partnership with Connexions on a number of projects, said: "It's obviously a personal choice but we'd advise staff to think very carefully before going on a show like Big Brother.

"If they wanted to return to youth work, they could find it difficult to establish a professional relationship with a young person who had been watching them on TV for ten weeks.

"For example, information they might disclose about their personal lives could change the way they were perceived."

Kitten's rise to fame on the reality show has been a turbulent one.

She has annoyed both her housemates and the producers with her confrontational antics.

On Monday the 24-year-old ignored safety worries to climb the roof and admitted she was a "prickly" character.

Yesterday she announced her latest act of rebellion - a Big Brother hostage drama.

She said: "If anybody gets evicted and they don't want to leave, just go to the Love Shack and get as many people who will support you to hold you hostage or something."

But she admitted being disappointed with the lack of reaction to her rebellion.

She said of the show's producers: "I want them to be giving it loads and they're just like, 'Ooh ignore her'."

Meanwhile, her father Kenneth Pinder, 57, of St Albans, Hertfordshire, condemned her claims that she was once a prostitute in east London as lies.

Kitten, a left-wing lesbian activist, had told housemates of soliciting at the age of 16 but Mr Pinder insisted she was still studying at boarding school at the time.