Ministers will today resist calls from two senior Labour backbenchers to toughen up press controls.

As the government's Communications Bill passes through the Commons this afternoon, veteran Labour MPs Chris Mullin and Clive Soley will try to force newspapers to behave more responsibly.

The legislation will then be passed backed to the Lords, who have also sought to bring the press under the scrutiny of the new media super-regulator Ofcom.

Mullin and Soley have proposed separate amendments to the bill giving Ofcom the authority currently enjoyed by the Press Complaints Commission under the system of self-regulation.

Editors have lobbied the government to oppose the amendments on the grounds that they would be an intrusion into the historic freedoms of the press.

Former journalist Mullin and Soley argue that the PCC has failed to be rigorous enough in the upholding of standards and complaints.

Mullin said on Monday that since the PCC was established in 1993 media behaviour had worsened rather than improved.

"It's 10 years since the industry was warned it was drinking in the 'last chance saloon'," he said.

"Since then, the quality of journalism has deteriorated and the number of abuses has multiplied."

But industry secretary Patricia Hewitt, who has helped pilot the bill through parliament, insisted that self-regulation was working.

"We will resist any attempt to put press regulation on a statutory footing," she said.

Hewitt also denied claims from Rupert Murdoch's News International that plans to transfer powers to vet newspaper takeovers from her department to Ofcom would be the "thin end of the wedge" for press freedom.

A spokesman for the company - owners of the Times, Sun and News of the World - said the legislation was "very dangerous".

Hewitt said the plans were only intended to improve the "transparency" behind decisions such as that made in 2001 to approve Richard Desmond's takeover of the Express and Star titles.

"What we're doing in the bill is keeping in place public interest regulation for newspaper takeovers and mergers, but we're handing over the advisory role to Ofcom and that will be much more transparent way of dealing with cases," she said.

"But it doesn't become a statutory regulator of content."