Cameron brings in Thatcherite Javid to spearhead business push

David Cameron has named Thatcherite former banker Sajid Javid as the first Conservative business secretary in 18 years, with instructions to cut red tape, create 3m apprenticeships and boost exports.

Mr Javid, the son of an immigrant Pakistani bus driver, will take his place at the cabinet table on Tuesday in a new ministerial line-up that Mr Cameron hopes will help him develop a new brand of "blue-collar Conservatism".

The promotion of Mr Javid is emblematic of Mr Cameron's plan to lead a government with free market instincts allied to a series of measures to show the Conservatives are on the side of aspiring working families.

"Deregulation will be top of his agenda," said one ally of Mr Javid. The minister is expected to revisit Tory proposals to scale back employment regulations, blocked by Vince Cable, his Liberal Democrat predecessor.

Meanwhile Mr Cameron will tell his new cabinet on Tuesday that the Queen's Speech will contain a bill to help create 3m new apprenticeships aimed at achieving the highest employment rate of any major economy.

The bill would reduce the annual benefit cap to £23,000 with savings directed into apprenticeships; another bill would double the amount of free childcare that working families with 3 and 4 year olds receive to 30 hours a week.

Mr Cameron wants to exploit the rout of the Labour party in last week's election by shifting his party to the centre ground - aware that his party has not done enough to change its somewhat elitist image.

He will tell the cabinet: "Every decision we take, every policy we pursue, every programme we initiate, never forget: we're here to give everyone in our country the chance to make the most of their life."

The cabinet will include more women - Amber Rudd becomes energy secretary, Priti Patel moves to employment - and will have less of a public school bias: the Sutton Trust says that 43 per cent of ministers attended comprehensive schools, up from 21 per cent in 2010.

Among those moving up are Greg Clark, who replaces Eric Pickles as local government secretary, John Whittingdale, replacing Mr Javid at culture, and Greg Hands, who as Treasury chief secretary will be responsible for identifying cuts to complete the task of deficit reduction.

Boris Johnson will serve out his term as London mayor until 2016 and will not have a ministerial role. But Mr Cameron has asked him to attend the weekly political session of cabinet.

The reshuffle also bears the familiar imprint of George Osborne: Mr Javid, Ms Rudd, Mr Hands and Robert Halfon, the new Conservative deputy chairman, all previously worked as his parliamentary private secretary.

With the near destruction of his Liberal Democrats coalition partners last week, Mr Cameron now has many more ministerial jobs to hand out to Conservative MPs - a vital tool of party management as a divisive EU referendum approaches.

Labour MPs meanwhile met for a postmortem on the party's defeat last week, with David Miliband joining the criticism of the leadership of his brother Ed, whom he said had sought to "divide" the country between rich and poor.

Mr Miliband, who left the Commons to work for a charity in New York, confirmed he would not try to engineer a return to Westminster to seek the Labour leadership.

Meanwhile Nicola Sturgeon, Scottish National party leader, joined her 56 newly elected MPs as they arrived for their first day of work at Westminster.

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