Universities may have to increase their fees to remain at a world-class level, Universities UK has said.

The representative body for higher education institutions said the cap may have to be raised to £5,000 or £7,000.

The conclusion comes in a survey of vice-chancellors, Changing Landscapes: future scenarios for variable tuition fees, which provoked instant anger from student groups and opposition parties.

“It is no surprise that many of the vice-chancellors involved with this research would like to see tuition fees more than doubled,” said Liberal Democrat universities spokesman Stephen Williams.

“The conclusions would be very different if students’ views were considered.”

The National Union of Students (NUS) was equally scathing.

“In the context of the current recession, it is extremely arrogant for university vice-chancellors to be fantasising about charging their students even higher fees and plunging them into over £32,000 of debt,” said NUS president Wes Streeting.

But professor Rick Trainor, president of Universities UK, defended the report as an “evidence-based contribution”.

“While our universities must receive sufficient funding to remain world class, any changes to the current fee regime must also take account of the implications for widening participation,” he said.

“UK higher education requires further injections of resource, from whatever source, particularly for teaching and learning. This is essential if we are to meet the rising expectations of UK and overseas students as well as employers.”

The Russell Group, a collaboration of 20 research universities, claims it has also begun investigating a range of options to solve the current funding problem and to ensure that financial burden is spread fairly.

“An increase in tuition fees is clearly one of those options but we want to be one hundred per cent sure about the impact of any changes to fee levels on students before putting forward our own proposals,” a statement from the group states.

“The evidence to date is very promising. The introduction of variable fees in 2006 had no adverse impact on recruitment: applications to English universities have continued to increase from students of all social backgrounds. This is not surprising, because educational under-achievement – not finance – is the key reason for a lower proportion of working-class students in higher education.

“Our institutions have a key role to play in helping the UK survive the economic downturn and to stimulate a recovery. It is therefore vital they are given the right conditions to continue to flourish.”

The report comes a day after Cambridge University became the first higher education institution to confirm it would only take A-Level students with at least one elite A* grade.

In 2007, the university rejected around 5,500 sixth-formers who applied with straight As in their exams.