In an address to the Universities Australia gala dinner, Mr Clare said changes under the Universities Accord would need to ensure poorer students had better access to universities.

"87 per cent of young people from wealthy families have a TAFE or uni qualification," Mr Clare said.

"Only 59 per cent of young people from poor families do. In other words, more than 40 per cent of people from poor families don't have the sort of qualifications that almost everyone is going to need in the years ahead.

"In a world like that, closing this gap is more important than ever."

Mr Clare said 34 university study hubs would be set up in regional areas and suburbs over the next 12 to 18 months to support young people who might not otherwise go to university.

Mr Clare spoke positively about the accord's recommendations of a needs-based funding system and guaranteed places for regional students, but the government has yet to give its formal response to the 47 recommendations.

The Education Minister said the vocational education and higher education sectors would need to become more integrated, such as making it easier for prior learning at TAFE to be counted towards a university degree.

He said the government would work through the Accord report over coming months and determine what needed to be done first.

Mr Clare also expressed alarm over the dropping rate of some groups of students finishing year 12.

He said over the past five years, the proportion of public school students finishing school dropped from 83 per cent to 76 per cent.

Meanwhile, in 2017 the rate of students from poor families finished school was 76 per cent and this has since declined to 70 per cent.

"If we want to turn that around, we need to do a better job of helping young people who fall behind to catch up. Because they are the ones who aren't finishing school," he said.

"And at the moment, if you are a child from a poor family or from the regions you are three times more likely to be that child, who falls behind.

"Most of those children who fall behind when they are little never catch up. But they could."

He said the next National School Reform Agreement would aim to address these problems by tying funding to "things that work".