John Denham

[close] John Yorke Denham FRSA (b. 1953) is an English politician who served as Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills from 2007 to 2009 and Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government from 2009 to 2010. A member of the Labour Party, he was Member of Parliament (MP) for Southampton Itchen from 1992 to 2015.

Denham served in government under Prime Minister Tony Blair from 1997 to 2003, as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State from 1997 to 1998 and a Minister of State from 1998 to 2003. He resigned from government over the Iraq War in 2003, and subsequently became Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee. Denham returned to government in 2007 as a Member of Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Cabinet, which he served in until Labour's election defeat in 2010.

He was briefly Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government in 2010, and appointed by opposition leader Ed Miliband as Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills later in the same year. Denham announced in 2011 that he would be standing down from Parliament at the next election, and held his final front bench position as Parliamentary Private Secretary to Miliband from 2011 to 2013.

Denham is Chair of the Southern Policy Centre, which he co-founded with Professor Francis Davis, as a think tank responding to challenges and opportunities for southern England with specialisms in open data research and new forms of public participation in politics.

Denham is director of the English Labour Network and a Professorial Fellow on English Identity and Politics at Southampton University.