Bill Dickinson, an employment law specialist, has written to the Department for Education and Employment accusing fellow governors at Blackpool Sixth Form College of failing to follow correct procedure.

He claims Mr Fulford was not given a proper hearing and that the college wrongfully attempted to get him to retire on health grounds before resorting to summary dismissal when this failed.

His complaint comes as Mr Fulford, 68, takes his case to an employment tribunal. Chair of governors John McGlynn said he was not aware of the complaint or the impending tribunal, bt insists that the college is confident that it followed all the rules of

governance.

He said the college has advertised for a new principal and a short-list of candidates has been drawn up.

Mr Fulford was suspended over alleged financial irregularities earlier this year and finally dismissed at a governors’ meeting in August. It was a “unanimous” decision by governors, although Mr Dickinson left the meeting before the vote was taken.

The college was awarded a grade four (“less than satisfactory”) for governance in a Further Education Funding Council report published in August 1998. But the re-inspection, in 1999, found that “governance of the college is now adequate”.