EDUCATION bosses are under fire after refusing to reveal if a Hampshire head teacher cleared of assaulting a pupil can return to her job.

Hampshire County Council says Eve Ritchie-Fallon will be going back to work following an internal inquiry held in the wake of a controversial court case last year.

But the authority is refusing to confirm if she will resume her duties at the Forest Education Centre in Dibden Purlieu.

After taking over in 2001 she transformed the failing unit into one heaped with praise by inspectors.

But Mrs Ritchie-Fallon has been told to meet senior managers to discuss her future – seven months after she was cleared at Southampton Magistrates’ Court of assaulting a 15-year-old boy who refused to stop smoking.

New Forest East MP Dr Julian Lewis said she was a highly respected head teacher who should be allowed to return to her job.

He added: “This has taken far too long and has been cloaked in far too much secrecy. Mrs Ritchie-Fallon should be fully exonerated, re-instated and some common sense brought to bear on the situation.

“Hampshire County Council is consistently rated as excellent but I think its handling of this matter has fallen short of its normally high standards.

“When someone is acquitted in court that should be the end of the matter. If there had to be a subsequent internal inquiry it should have been conducted as quickly as possible.

“Following its conclusion no cloud should be allowed to hang over Mrs Ritchie-Fallon’s reputation.”

She was suspended on full pay in November 2008 after she was accused of slapping a pupil around the face – a charge she denied.

At her trial prosecution witnesses included a 15-year-old boy who admitted that he had been smoking cannabis on the morning of the incident and only half of what he told police at the time could now be believed.

Despite being cleared Mrs Ritchie- Fallon was forced to attend a disciplinary hearing last week following the inquiry conducted by the county council.

The Daily Echo understands that her 18-month suspension has now been lifted following the hearing, which lasted all day.

Gareth Newberry, of the National Union of Head Teachers, who represented her, said she was entitled to return to her job.

A member of staff at the Forest Education Centre, which deals with some of the worst behaved pupils in the county, confirmed that Mrs Ritchie- Fallon was still absent. Asked when she might return the employee said: “We don’t know.”

Hythe county councillor Brian Dash, chairman of the centre’s management committee, said: “This must be a huge relief for Eve – the protracted process must have been extremely stressful for her.

“I hope she will return to make her contribution, as she has done for so many years.”

Last night Mrs Ritchie-Fallon, 57, declined to comment at her home near Lymington.