The General Manager of the Armidale-Dumaresq Council has left early, and there are now calls for more heads to roll.

The specifics remain unclear, but a statement from the Council said Armidale’s GM Shane Burns has taken a payout, which will see him leave his job several months before his contract expires.

It is understood he was shown the door by the new Mayor, Laurie Bishop.

Mr Burns says he wanted to stay for his full term after working as general manager for thirteen years.

“It was always my intention to serve my contract to its conclusion and it doesn’t make any sense to terminate it,” he said.

The abrupt end entitles Mr Burns to 38 weeks’ pay, about $119,000.

One councillor says it has sent the rest of the local government body into disarray, and they should now all be removed.

“Armidale-Dumaresq Council has become totally dysfunctional in my view and I'm going to call on the Division of Local Government and the Minister for Local Government to urgently consider suspending or, indeed, sacking Armidale-Dumaresq Council,” Councillor Herman Beyersdorf said.

“We've come to the end of the road for a number of reasons and this is just the last straw, I think.”

The Minister for Local Government, Don Page, says there are several steps to take between now and a drastic move like firing the entire group.

“We do have legislation giving the Minister power to intervene with a Council that's dysfunctional, but there are certain criteria that have to apply before I, as Minister, would be prepared to do that,” he said.

“There'd have to be obvious evidence of dysfunctionality, then they'd be given a Notice to Improve and, if that didn't happen, then I do have the capacity to suspend the Council for three months and try and sort out the problems.”

The Council now says Keith Lockyer will perform the role of Acting General Manager; it is too early to tell if this has settled the perceived chaos in the council.

The stoush between the Armidale Mayor and General Manager has played out in national newspapers, which described the tension when the new Mayor joined the office.

“It became very obvious early in the piece that a change agenda was not welcome,” Mayor Laurie Bishop said a meeting in January.

“The mayoral car was not cleaned and had two illegal tyres, I still don't have a business card with mayor written on it and it took weeks for them to show me where the toilets and the tea-making facilities were.”

Several have joined the called to sack the lot, saying internal bickering cannot help the community.