A bizarre mix-up over names saw thousands of pounds that should have been paid to the leader of the county council go instead to a maintenance fitter with the same name.

Allowances totalling more than £21,000 that should have gone to Cllr Paul Carter over a seven-month period were paid by mistake to another KCC employee by the same name.

He was a maintenance fitter working at a depot in Aylesford, near Maidstone - but had disappeared before KCC was able to get all the money back. It means KCC has had to write off close to £20,000 of taxpayers' money.

The mix-up over the payments came to light in April 2008 when the council leader's secretary in his private office noted his overdraft was near its limit.

In a statement, KCC said that as soon as the error was identified, it deducted £769 from maintenance man Paul Carter's net monthly salary of £1,600 but was unable to recover the rest of the money because he resigned and left the country. He is now believed to be in Eastern Europe.

The statement added: "KCC always undertake to fully recover any overpayment made via the payroll regardless of whether the individual remains employed or not.

"In this case we followed our normal procedure and informed Debt Recovery to continue with the full recovery of the debt.

"Unfortunately Mr Carter left the country and we have been unable to trace him. We will still continue to re-establish full recovery of this debt if possible."

Mr Carter said: "It was a payroll error within KCC. Clearly there was an employee of the authority by the name of Paul Carter and my allowance was mistakenly paid into the other Paul Carter's account."

It is understood that KCC has not involved the police in the matter.