More central control will result from the government's policy on student funding, Damian Green has warned.

Speaking at a Conservative conference fringe event in Blackpool, the shadow education secretary pledged that a Conservative government would not only abolish fees, but would scrap plans for an Office of Fair Access, or Offa, as it has become known.

He argued that "the scope of this Offa will suffocate universities with bureaucracy".

The higher education sector was being offered a "poisoned chalice", he added, pledging an expansion of the further education sector, which would offer more vocational training.

The shadow education secretary also highlighted recent research by Professor Clare Callendar of South Bank University, which found that the implementation of higher tuition and top-up fees would deter poorer students from attending universities.

While ministers insist that more students enter university, the Tories quoted the numbers completing their courses, figures that Green described as "more intellectually reputable".

"I want every degree to be worthwhile, and for every student to be admitted on the ability to learn, not the ability to pay," he said.

Also attending the meeting Ivor Crewe, president of Universities UK, insisted that the new system of student funding is vital for helping fill a funding black hole, regardless of whether there was university expansion.

"Universities are disappointed and really quite surprised it is the Conservatives proposing fixed fees," he said.

Describing the higher education as the "engine room of the economy", he argued that, "if business and industry cannot find graduates over here, they will look elsewhere".

Further decentralisation of the sector was also needed, to allow it to become more competitive internationally.

"Universities will remain the UK's last nationalised industry with all the problems that brings," he said.