Fewer children from state schools or poorer backgrounds are going to top universities, a report claimed.

The Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission said there were 126 fewer students from the most disadvantaged backgrounds at Russell Group universities – which includes Oxford University – in 2011-2012 than in 2002-2003.

But Oxford University spokesman Matt Pickles said the proportion of UK undergraduates at Oxford from state schools had increased to 57.5 per cent over the past 10 years.

He said one in 10 Oxford students now came from a household with an annual income of less than £16,000.