Healey and Denham depart the shadow Cabinet

John Healey and John Denham have resigned from the shadow Cabinet ahead of Ed Miliband’s reshuffle.

Healey is, officially, departing for family reasons. But I doubt that many of those closest to Miliband will particularly mind his departure. I expect that Miliband may also take this chance to move Andy Burnham, who knows the health brief from his time in government and is an effective if one dimensional media performer, from education into the health brief.

These two resignations free up a couple of the big shadow Cabinet jobs as Miliband prepares to shuffle his pack. It is almost certain that the Labour leader, who has just won himself complete control over shadow Cabinet appointments, will promote members of the 2010 intake to the full shadow Cabinet. Many in the leader’s office are attracted to the idea of presenting a new, fresher face for Labour which would emphasise his ‘new generation’ theme.