Universities will introduce pay ratios to bring vice-Chancellor pay under control amid fears that a new regulator is about to end the “gravy train” of pay rises, The Daily Telegraph can reveal.

A “fair remuneration code” due to be announced in the new year will limit vice-Chancellors’ salaries to 6.4 times that earned by their academic staff, according to the proposals.

The code, which will be issued by the Committee of University Chairs (CUC), will also ban vice-Chancellors from sitting on their own remuneration committees, which decide how much to pay them.

The committees will themselves be made to publish an annual report and will need to disclose the salaries of the vice-Chancellor and their highest earners.

They will also have to justify why pay increases have been awarded.

A consultation on the new code will go out in January, before a final version is issued in April.