GOWER MP Martin Caton had threatened to rebel against the Government over controversial proposals to restrict the amount of information published about MPs' expenses.

The Labour MP had informed party whips, who are responsible for disciplining MPs, that he would not support the Government if it insisted on forcing through a vote on exempting expenses information from Freedom of Information laws.

However, Mr Caton (pictured) will not now be required to defy his party after the Government staged an embarrassing climb-down over the plans.

Previously, Downing Street had insisted it would hold a vote on exempting expenses information from Freedom of Information laws and that Labour MPs would be forced to back it.

But on Wednesday night, the Government decided to abandon the vote after opposition parties said they would not support it.

Mr Caton told the Post: "I had made it clear to whips that I would not be able to support them on this and I had signed an Early Day Motion on the issue tabled by Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson opposing the moves. I can only imagine the Government stance changed because the whips did not feel they could get it through without the support of the opposition and backbench Labour MPs.

"If we had gone with this statutory instrument, we would have been saying that elected Members of Parliament would have become the only public officials who are exempted from the Freedom of Information Act in terms of allowances and expenses.

"I believe that is wrong in principle and would send out an awful message to the people we seek to represent."

Llanelli MP Nia Griffith said she would be voting on the existing motion which promises the automatic publication of MPs' expenses.

She said: "I shall still be voting for the automatic publication of MPs' expenses, which will make the situation much clearer and will mean that people will be able to get access to the information up front."

The High Court said last year receipts for MPs' expenses should be published.

The row followed a long-running Freedom of Information case in which campaigners sought to get details of MPs' expenses, which totalled £87.6 million in 2006/07, published.

It had been expected that all MPs' expenses details would then be published, but Commons leader Harriet Harman told MPs last week the Government was bringing forward a plan to exempt MPs' expenses from the scope of the FOI Act.

This would have seen expenses published under 26 headings but not the details of claims for individual items.

Downing Street had indicated that Labour MPs would be expected to support this policy in a vote on Thursday, but the Conservative and Lib Dems said they would oppose the move.

However, shortly after the end of Prime Minister's questions, the Government revealed the vote on the FOI proposal would not take place.

Ms Harman said the vote had been abandoned because of the "lack of cross party support" and confirmed she would hold discussions on how to proceed.

But she defended the policy, saying it would "provide a legal underpinning for a package of changes which would achieve greater transparency in the publication of what MPs spend".

MPs will still vote on Thursday on separate proposals to tighten up the auditing of expenses and revisions to the expenses rule book. Earlier, Mr Brown blamed the Conservatives for what he said was a breakdown of a previous consensus over the way forward.

"We thought we had agreement on the FOI Act as part of this wider package," he told MPs.

"Recently that support that we believed we had from the main opposition party was withdrawn."

However, the Conservatives denied that they had initially struck a deal with Labour not to oppose the changes, saying there was "no question" of the party ever backing the move.

Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg said: "This is a humiliating climb-down for Gordon Brown after he was forced to accept that people will not tolerate MPs continuing to act like members of a secret society."