He said others – such as the National Institute for Health and Clinical excellence (NICE) – would be improved, Ministers would take back responsibility for policy issues and top salaries paid to the quangocracy would be published.

In a speech in London to the Reform think-tank yesterday, Mr Cameron promised: "With a Conservative Government, Ofcom as we know it will cease to exist.

"Its remit will be restricted to its narrow technical and enforcement roles. It will no longer play a role in making policy. And the policy-making functions it has today will be transferred back fully to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport."

He went on: "To enable NICE to recommend good drugs that it currently rejects, we will introduce payment-by-results for drug companies. Decisions should be based on what actually gets people better and we should pay the drugs companies according to their value to patients."

The Tory leader said there could be more than 1,000 quangos operating in Britain today. "This growth in the number of quangos, and in the scope of their influence, raises important questions for our democracy and politics."

These were questions of accountability, public spending and effectiveness of politics in addressing social problems.