THE top performing pupils in every secondary school in Scotland should be given automatic access to university regardless of their exam results, an education leader has claimed.

Gordon Watson, president of the UCU Scotland lecturers' union, said yesterday the drastic measure was required to widen access to higher education to pupils from poorer backgrounds.

His comments came after numerous studies showed social background is the most important factor in determining whether a young person achieves academically at school.

Access to university is tightly controlled, with pupils given priority depending on their exam results, although other factors are sometimes taken into consideration. Because some schools in deprived areas such as Glasgow have no pupils achieving five or more Highers in some years, they often send no pupils to university.

Michael Russell, the Education Secretary, has suggested giving universities targets on access in future, with fines if they fail.

However, Mr Watson told the UCU Scotland annual congress in Edinburgh more drastic action was required.

"We need to look at more initiatives to get the lowest performing schools to send more students to our universities. That would not adversely affect the top performing schools, while having a positive impact on the lowest performing schools," he said.

"The top pupils in every school should get access to the university system irrespective of the ability of the school or their exam grades.

"Top schools can bring pupils' grades up while poorer schools can bring them down because they don't necessarily concentrate on their top pupils.

"It would only involve a small amount of pupils, but it would have a huge impact by changing the culture in those schools and giving opportunities to talented pupils who would otherwise miss out."

The suggestion was welcomed by Robin Parker, president of NUS Scotland. He said: "There are parts of America that have done this on a limited scale and it has made inroads. Now is a critical time to get more students from different backgrounds into university and this is one of the ways of doing that.

"What would also be important is to make more places available to universities so these students would be additional and would not displace others."

Mr Russell told the meeting he had warned university principals about the danger to their reputation of using significant increases in public funding on boosting their own salaries.

The move follows dramatic increases in the salaries of principals, who can now earn upwards of £250,000, although recent increases have been more modest.

"Almost everyone who looks at this issue says restraint is required across the public sector and I have said to university principals that restraint applies to them," he said.

"University principals know this is a matter of some public concern and I am sure university principals will want to show that the increase in public funding they have received has been well spent. Members of the public will expect salaries to be in line with national norms and not in places where people will raise their eyebrows."

Later, the congress backed a motion to have principals pay capped.

Congress also supported a motion seeking to combat allegations of increased bullying in higher education.

The motion says particular concerns have been raised over staff being bullied into taking voluntary redundancy. The motion also highlights a general climate of bullying, with universities increasingly run by managers with little experience of academic life.