UNIVERSITIES attacked for discriminating against fee-paying pupils have pointed out that they turned down just as many of their state-school peers.

The Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference said it had “concerns” about admissions policies at seven universities after viewing statistics from leading schools.

But figures show that the independent sector is doing better than average in some cases.

The HMC said several universities, including Bristol, Edinburgh, the London School of Economics and Durham, gave “cause for anxiety” about admissions in some or all departments.

Concerns centred on universities that had rejected a large proportion of private-school applicants but which generally made fairly low A-level offers. But the HMC had not compared its findings with overall data for the universities - and these figures show that in some cases a higher proportion of state-school pupils had been rejected.

The English department at Bristol, flagged by the HMC as causing concern, rejected 76.7 per cent of the private-school pupils surveyed.

But officials at Bristol revealed that the department had turned down 85 per cent of state-school applicants.

And at Durham’s law department, another highlighted as worrying by the HMC, the proportion of state and private-school pupils rejected without an offer was identical.

A spokesman for Bristol University said: “We are irritated by what appears to be a failure to present a complete picture, and that they have criticised us on the back of inadequate statistics.

“It is unfortunate that the HMC appears to be presenting a partial and biased set of statistics. We feel that is unhelpful to young people who already experience a great deal of stress.”

Edward Gould, chairman of the HMC, said the survey was a sample and needed more work. “We were seeking to identify areas that needed further scrutiny,” he said, adding that universities should make their admissions criteria more transparent.

He said that next year the organisation hopes to survey both maintained and private schools. “I do not think the issue is independent versus maintained schools, but selective versus non-selective,” he added.