THE chief executive of the North-East’s biggest council is to retire, it has been announced.

George Garlick, who has headed Durham County Council since September 2008, will retire in January, when he reaches the age of 60.

In a message to staff and councillors, he said he was making the announcement in plenty of time to allow a recruitment process for his replacement.

“I won’t at this stage go into my enjoyment of the last seven years or my thanks to yourselves and others for the support, hard work and many achievements in this time, as there is still a long time to go.

“Until then, as we still have much to do, it remains business as usual,” he said.

Previously chief executive of Stockton Borough Council, Mr Garlick led Durham as it became a unitary authority at the abolition of the previous two-tier setup in April 2009.

He has attracted criticism over his earnings, around £200,000 a year. But in his seven years at the helm, the county has attracted investments such as the Hitachi train factory and Atom bank and cultural events such as the Lindisfarne Gospels exhibition, an Ashes Test and the Lumiere light festival.

He has also led the North-East’s biggest council’s response to government spending cuts running into hundreds of millions of pounds, prompting hundreds of job losses.

Richard Bell, the Conservative group leader, said: “George directed the successful merger of the old county council and district councils from 2009.

“This not only enabled customer service to continue as normal, but also enabled the new unitary council to cope with unprecedented reductions in funding from central government. That is an achievement for which all County Durham residents should be thankful.”

Simon Henig, the council’s Labour leader throughout Mr Garlick’s time, said he would comment at an appropriate stage in the future.

The process of finding a successor will begin shortly. Among the frontrunners are likely to be Mr Garlick’s assistant chief executive Lorraine O’Donnell and neighbourhood services chief Terry Collins, plus chief executives from other smaller authorities.