A highly critical report on Kent County Council’s streetlight switch-off says the council failed to consult properly and kept councillors in the dark about the costs.

The independent report commissioned by KCC details a series of flaws in developing and then implementing the policy of switching off streetlights across the county.

It concludes the process was tarnished, had the feel of a “tick-box” exercise and lacked transparency.

It is particularly damning about KCC’s failure to consult residents adequately.

Officers highlighted inadequacies in the consultation and recommended ways they could be addressed but they were not acted on.

Legal advice suggesting vulnerable residents with concerns about the changes could be excluded because it was being conducted online was “not reflected in the public consultation process.”

Neither was there evidence that councillors were aware of these reservations about consultation.

The report also refers to a comment by an unnamed councillor who admitted that KCC had done “the bare minimum” by way of consultation.

The report is damning about the lack of a paper trail over the decision-making process, describing it as opaque.

“It is not possible to determine exactly how the Equalities Impact Assessment and consultation were considered in the decision-making process and how they influenced the implementation of the scheme,” it states.

The report says it was not clear the opposition of Kent Police to the switch-off was relayed to either councillors or others.

It goes on to suggest councillors were kept in the dark about how much money would be needed - with even one unidentified cabinet member in charge at the time saying had he known, he may have changed his mind.

As it was, the £2.9m costs were only discussed by a group of officers and “it is possible many members were not fully aware of the financial implications of the implementation of the policy.”

“It would be difficult to argue the implementation of the policy has entirely demonstrated best practice in governance, equalities or community engagement terms" - independent report

However, on the plus side, the report says that in many ways “the implementation can be considered a great success” because it cut energy consumption and costs, although savings would only be achieved after four years.

But it concludes lessons should be learned: “It would be difficult to argue the implementation of the policy has entirely demonstrated best practice in governance, equalities or community engagement terms.”

The report will be considered by councillors at a meeting today.

The controversy around the switch-off has prompted KCC to end the scheme.

Instead, KCC is to phase out the controversial switch-off programme and instead replace all 120,000 lights with LED bulbs that are now cheaper than they were.

In February, Cllr David Brazier, the politician in charge, stood down from his role as cabinet member for transport.

The decision was attributed to the controversy around the streetlight scheme.