Cash which was meant to be a lifeline to help keep council tax down was today dubbed a "poke in the eye" for Brighton and Hove.

Councils across Sussex have been handed tiny increases from Gordon Brown's £340m local authority cash pot announced yesterday to prevent a repeat of last year's massive council tax increases.

But when the money was handed out today, Brighton and Hove City Council was given an extra £884,000.

Other authorities raked in millions of pounds - with Birmingham getting £12.3m.

Councillor Keith Taylor, convenor of the Green group on the city council, said: "It is a poke in the eye.

"What difference will this make when we are faced with a 16.5 per cent rise in council tax?

"The Government is failing completely to see our financial crisis. There is a huge spending gap to fill. "

East Sussex County Council got just an extra £6,000 and West Sussex County Council £5,000.

The councils missed out because the extra £340m was allocated using the same funding formula which gave them such low settlements in the first place.

Last month, Brighton and Hove's increase in total Government grant for 2004/5 was only 3.6 per cent, or £6.2m, as cash was shifted from the south to Labour heartlands in the midlands and the north.

Today's cash boosts that increase by only 0.5 per cent.

East Sussex's grant was up only 4.5 per cent, or £11.9m, and West Sussex also got a 4.5 per cent, or £17.1m.

The latest extra payments for those authorities are too small to even register as a further percentage increase.

The councils now face the challenge of keeping bills down after Mr Brown and Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott coupled the additional payment with a stark warning they would "cap" councils which opted for unacceptable increases.

Mr Prescott and Mr Brown want increases to be "low single figures".

Today, Local Government Minister Nick Raynsford added: "Unreasonably large council tax increases will neither be justified nor acceptable.

"So the Government is prepared to use targeted capping powers next year. But we hope that will not be necessary."

The extra cash allocations to the district councils in East Sussex were Eastbourne £68,000 (0.8 per cent); Hastings £70,000 (0.9 per cent); Lewes £55,000 (1.2 per cent); Rother £44,000 (0.8 per cent); Wealden £52,000 (0.8 per cent).

In East Sussex Adur got £57,000 (1.5 per cent); Arun £65,000 (0.8 per cent); Chichester £47,000 (0.8 per cent); Crawley £101,000 (1.2 per cent); Horsham £42,000 (0.8 per cent); Mid Sussex £46,000 (0.9 per cent) and Worthing £51,000 (0.8 per cent).