One of Labour’s finer achievements has been to introduce freedom of information to Britain. It has allowed the press and public to root around in government departments and other public authorities to examine the nuts and bolts of how we are governed. In practice the doors have been ajar rather than wide open, with many areas of interest, including the formulation of policy, defence, international relations, honours and environmental information, open to scrutiny only if applicants can demonstrate disclosure is in the public interest. Even where such applications are successful, much useful information is blanked out.

Now the government, in the person of Lord Falconer, the jovial constitutional affairs secretary, wants to make it even harder. Where applicants mount a public interest case, the cost of assessing it will be included in the £600 limit (£450 for public corporations) the government has set for each application. That will provide an easy excuse for rejecting information requests that are vaguely controversial. As Maurice Frankel, director of the Campaign for the Freedom of Information, puts it: “The more substantial the public interest issue raised by someone’s request, the more likely it will be to be refused, because the time authorities spend considering the issues will count against it.”

In another restrictive move, requests from organisations and individuals will be “aggregated”, with the cost limit applied to them. Media organisations will inevitably fall foul of this proposed change. The Sir Humphreys must be hugging themselves with pleasure. One puzzling element is why Falconer is so keen to turn a success story sour. What’s in it for him? We are at the fag end of the Blair government. As the prime minister’s former flatmate, he cannot expect preferment under Gordon Brown. Having rightly won kudos for freedom of information, he should leave it as it is. North of the border it is working well and there are no plans to scale it back. As Ronald Reagan once said to overactive underlings: “Don’t just do something, stand there.”