Neither central Government nor the Audit Commission routinely collect the information requested on the salaries of local authority chief executives. The Commission’s recent report on the labour market for council chief executives, “Tougher at the Top?”, drew on data from the Local Government Association’s annual survey of chief executives and chief officers’ salaries. The report also used an Audit Commission database identifying rates of turnover, tenure length and sources of recruitment of single tier and county council chief executives since 1998. These data were collected specifically for the research. A copy of the report can be found on the Audit Commission’s website:
http://www.audit-commission.gov.uk/Products/NATIONAL-REPORT/50CD0741-0884-4636-9525-B1A3FBAA8432/TougherAtTheTop22July08REP.pdf