Barring a highly improbable turnaround, the Howard government looks headed for certain defeat at this year’s election. So it’s interesting to compare it with other instances of governments in that position.

A common response when a government sees itself soon being in opposition is to make changes that they hope will hamstring their successors in government and provide some advantage to the opposition. Given the traditionally unrestrained nature of executive power in Australia, this is one of the main ways that the balance is kept from tilting too far in the government’s favour.

So, for example, in 1991 the Victorian Labor government, which was clearly on the way out, addressed the problem of inadequate resourcing of opposition MPs by introducing a second staff member for each electorate. The extra staff were scrapped by the incoming Kennett government, but later reinstated.

A more significant case was in 1948 when the Chifley government, also facing likely defeat, reformed the previous winner-take-all electoral system for the Senate (which had delivered docile government majorities) by introducing proportional representation, now firmly established as one of the most democratic features of the federal landscape.

So it would be reasonable to suspect that the current government’s nationwide review of Freedom of Information legislation, announced yesterday, fits the same pattern. FOI is a powerful tool for an opposition, and it would make sense for a prospective opposition to try to strengthen it while it still has the chance.

As it happens, though, there’s nothing in the announcement to suggest that’s what will happen. The terms of reference for the inquiry are all about “harmonisation”, “the desirability of minimising the regulatory burden”, and “the legitimate interests of governments”.

This doesn’t sound like a win for open government. As News Ltd boss John Hartigan said, “Nowhere do they talk about the public’s right to know what is going on and whether the existing laws are upholding those rights or allowing them to be abused.”

Maybe the habits of wielding and centralising power are too firmly ingrained in this government for it to be able to change. Or maybe the attorney-general just hasn’t been reading the opinion polls.