The Lord Chancellor has defended Government plans to amend the Freedom of Information Act and maintained it is “reasonable” to impose stricter limits on the cost and number of requests.

Giving the keynote speech at today’s Press Gazette media law conference at Reuters, Lord Falconer said the Government’s FoI proposals were “neither a return to secret government nor an assault on the public’s right to know or the freedom of the press”.

“The public have a right to know information,” he said. “But why should it be in the interests of the press to determine when and how they get it?”