Slough Borough Council spent a reported £29,000 on computer software it never used, forgot it had and can’t access, it has been revealed.

Councillor Frank O’Kelly said the council’s former head of internal audit had bought the software shortly before leaving. But the replacement manager has said he only learned of the programme recently, that it had never been used, and that he didn’t know how to access it.

Mike Smith, head of internal audit, told councillors: “I found out fairly recently that we have some audit software and I understand it’s called AuditBoard. It seems to have been acquired last year, it’s never been used. I know that we’re not sure how we can access it.”

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Mr Smith’s revelation came after councillor O’Kelly asked if he had ‘seen or heard of an audit software installed at Slough Borough Council last year’.

Councillor O’Kelly said: “I looked at an email I found in June 2023 from Tariq Mansour who was the head of internal audit at that time. Tariq didn’t stay here long, he stayed three months. But he reported to me he spent £29,000 on a software system called AuditBoard.”

Councillor O’Kelly asked whether the council could use the software, adding that it may also have an annual licence fee.

But Mr Smith said that, having researched it, ‘it doesn’t seem like the best system’.

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The revelation came at a meeting of Slough Borough Council’s audit and governance committee – which scrutinises council management – on Thursday, October 31.

Councillors heard of problems linked to a recent ‘churn’ at the top of the council, with several council managers and staff having left and been replaced in the past year.

External auditors from accountants Grant Thornton noted that a ‘lack of stability’ in senior finance staff at the council meant that accounts dating back as far as 2021 have still not been published.

And they said that the council had also not carried out actions Grant Thornton had recommended as far back as 2021.

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Alexa Ngini from Grant Thornton said: “It’s well known that the council has governed with a lot of churn and that has stymied the improvement process significantly.”

However she added that had also struggled to even get council staff to meet with her. She said: “At pretty much every part of the organisation we wanted to touch we had very little proactivity or responses to emails.

“There were many experiences when I would turn up to meetings and people just wouldn’t turn up without any prior notice. It was a frustrating process.”

Grant Thornton’s lead auditor for Slough Borough Council Julie Masci said she hoped a more ‘stable’ management it could start to improve.

She said: “We recognise that it has been a challenging period for the council particularly given some of the churn of officers.

“But given that we are now in the position that the council has a much more stable senior management team we are now urging the council to take high priority action.”