Council chiefs to reveal pay deals

The Government said it was introducing the measures to ensure an open debate on the pay of council chief executives, and to encourage the public to challenge exhorbitant council salaries.

Twenty chief executives of local authorities are currently paid higher salaries than the Prime Minister.

A number of chief executives, lately dismissed from positions at the head of public sector organisations, have walked away with over half-a-million pounds.

John Healey, the Local Government Minister, said that he was concerned that the level of disclosure required of local councils was too low.

"Recently we’ve seen council chief executives’ salaries spiralling, with some changing their top managers as regularly as premiership football clubs – sometimes with big pay-offs for failure," he said. "This can’t go on."

The level of disclosure of salaries in the public sector was currently "a good deal lower than we now require, rightly, from civil servants and Ministers and the private sector," he said.

"It’s time we brought them up to that standard."

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