DAVID CAMERON’S underhand attempts to scrap transparency laws and stifle opposition makes Margaret Thatcher’s legacy look liberal, Labour deputy leader Tom Watson said yesterday.

Mr Watson savaged the Prime Minister’s “fundamentally illiberal” assault on a raft of rights used to keep the government in check.

In a speech at London’s Southbank Centre, the civil rights champion demanded the government drop its “sinister” review of the Freedom of Information Act.

He said it was evidence that Mr Cameron was “governing from the shadows” despite pledging a new era of transparency before becoming PM.

When leader of the opposition, Mr Cameron said “sunlight is the best disinfectant” and promised to “bring the operation of government out into the open.”

Mr Watson admitted that he had been “quite excited” by the prospect and publicly praised Mr Cameron at the time.

But he said the Tories were now “moving to a new era of private government, where ministers know best.

“At every turn, they shrink from the light of transparency and retreat into the shadows,” he said.

He also criticised the Tory crackdown on dissent, highlighting how they are attacking the right to strike, choking off Labour Party funding, looking to replace the Human Rights Act and cynically limiting the power of the Lords in revenge for its veto on tax credit cuts.

Taking aim at the Trade Union Bill, he said imposing thresholds that half the Cabinet failed to meet at the election displayed the Tories’ “arrogance of power.

“No civilised country denies its citizens the right to strike, yet this measure undermines that right,” he added.

“It goes beyond the political — it’s profoundly illiberal.”

And giving his verdict on Mr Cameron’s record, Mr Watson said: “He doesn’t look more illiberal than Thatcher, does he? Yet he’s doing things she would never have dreamed of.”

Mr Watson spoke out after the government attempted on Thursday to sneak out embarrassing stories in a torrent of publications.

The government bombarded journalists with 424 documents and 36 ministerial statements in a single day.

Hidden among them were admissions that three-quarters of tenants hit by the Bedroom Tax have to miss meals and a 45 per cent rise in the number of homeless families living in emergency bed and breakfasts.

Others revealed that Chancellor George Osborne has bolstered his Downing Street ambitions by assembling an army of 10 special advisers at a cost of as much as £700,000.

But far from trying to blind the public with information, Mr Watson said the Tories were simply trying to “turn off the lights” and “retreat into a darker and more secretive place.”

He said ministers believed they knew best and wanted to be left alone to govern from “shaded Whitehall warrens.”

Mr Watson faced questions over Labour’s own record on civil liberties in government.

Tony Blair’s government was widely criticised for proposing compulsory ID cards and powers for the police to detain terror suspects for 90 days without charge.

Labour’s deputy leader admitted in his speech that “left-leaning parties need to encourage internal debate about civil liberties.”

He vowed that in government Labour would strengthen the FOI laws, allow unions to hold online strike ballots and give more powers to back-bench MPs to pass laws.

“What I’m trying to make the case for is that both political parties, in the age of massive political power, really have to focus down on civil liberties,” he said.