The prime minister has reshaped his ministerial team following last week's general election victory with promotions for leading Blairites and some allies of Gordon Brown.

Tony Blair's sweeping reshuffle included making his controversial education adviser, Andrew Adonis, a peer and junior minister at the Department for Education and Skills, as well as new jobs for the former Tory MP Shaun Woodward and Lord Drayson, the pharmaceutical entrepreneur involved in cash-for-contracts allegations.

Adonis is widely seen as the driving force behind many of Blair's radical education policies including city academies and student fees.

He will work under Jacqui Smith as education minister, who herself was cited by Downing Street as a "rising star".

Number 10 insisted that the chancellor and prime minister had talked on the phone about the reshuffle "several times" yesterday and that Gordon Brown reportedly did not fight for allies to be promoted.

The appointments included a return to government for Beverley Hughes, who was forced out of the Home Office over the eastern European visas row.

One minister who quit over the Iraq war, the health specialist, Lord Hunt, rejoined the government at work and pensions.

But John Denham, who also resigned over the war, is said to have turned down several offers - rumoured to have included a possible Cabinet post.

Yvette Cooper, a Brown ally, was promoted to run housing and planning.

But her husband, the newly elected MP for Normanton, Ed Balls, who was previously the chancellor's top adviser at the Treasury, had let it be known he wanted to concentrate on learning the ropes as a backbencher.

Among those resigning or sacked are former local government minister Nick Raynsford and John Spellar, who was at the Northern Ireland Office.