by Jackie Storer BBC News Online political staff

Denham: Free to speak out

He had climbed the greasy pole from junior minister at the Department for Social Security, onwards and upwards through the Department of Health before finally securing the prized role of Minister of State at the Home Office.

But now, as he considers his first Labour party conference since 1997 as a mere backbencher, the 50-year-old Southampton Itchen MP says his decision to leave behind a job he loved and a salary that made the bank manager smile, is one he has never regretted.

It wasn't the easiest decision, although once I had made it I was absolutely certain I was right and I haven't regretted it since John Denham

Interestingly, while he does not believe Tony Blair deceived the electorate over his reasons for declaring war on Iraq, Mr Denham does blame the prime minister for what he calls "a series of mistaken judgements".

He argues that if Labour wins a third term in office, it should seriously reconsider "how we handle our relationships with the USA".

He also warns the party leadership against its centralising tendencies, stressing that if more effort had gone in to explaining the thinking behind controversial issues like foundation hospitals and university top up fees, there would be less opposition to them.

Trust on the line

Mr Denham, who has recently been appointed chairman of the home affairs select committee, says "principle" is the only reason why he decided to leave the front bench in March this year.

There's a sense now that trust and integrity are on the line - my view has always been the problem about the Iraq war is we made a series of mistaken judgements John Denham

"It wasn't the easiest decision, although once I had made it I was absolutely certain I was right and I haven't regretted it since," he said.

"I've not suffered any unpleasantness over it, even from colleagues that I've been with in government who profoundly disagree with me.

"Basically I have always taken the view that the war was a mistake, but I never really felt that people were deceived. Tony Blair said: 'I think this is the position, these are the issues, these are my judgements'. And I disagreed with them."

Mr Denham says he does not believe people were influenced either way "by this or that paragraph" in the government's September dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction or its February briefing note "which most people never read".

"So whilst there's a sense now that trust and integrity are on the line, my view has always been the problem about the Iraq war is we made a series of mistaken judgements," he said.

"Whether that is better or worse, but it is certainly different to accusing somebody of having deceived us."

UK-US relationship

Mr Denham says the lack of planning for the obvious void left in Iraq by Saddam Hussein's removal from power, and the way the UK agreed to follow the US into war, were among the more "mistaken judgements".

There is nothing worse than sitting by the phone every reshuffle hoping your name is going to come up John Denham

"We found it very hard to strike the right balance between being a good ally of the USA, which we should certainly be in the modern world, and having real influence over the way the USA operates," he said.

"The problem in the whole Iraq process was that the dominant US view was that they should do without the UN and they should take no responsibility for rebuilding Iraq.

"In many ways, both of those judgements are wrong and we are now saddled with the consequences that the American government, which is clearly in the leading position for planning the reconstruction of Iraq, didn't do so with any competence or any commitment.

"Somehow in the future, the lesson we've got to learn is that we can be a better ally with the USA if we are more openly and honestly critical of where we think the USA is going wrong and be prepared to say if necessary, 'we are not prepared to follow you down that route'.

"The two dangers are that we end up either saying we will follow whatever any American administration does or adopting a position, which some other countries have taken, which is if we don't agree with the USA, that's the end of the issue.

"In a complicated world, where you need international alliances, basically you need something between those two positions.

"Britain can't achieve that alone, but I think Britain should be working with, particularly other European countries to actually look at how the rest of the world works with the USA."

Rallying the cause

Mr Denham says he feels strongly that people "who criticise particular policy change" are not considered "against reform".

Emphasising his New Labour credentials, he argues that the government needs to "involve a wider range of people and experience in determining how exactly big strategic policies will work".

By the end of the week, I'm usually feeling quite claustrophobic and wanting to go and walk on a moorland somewhere, just to get away from people John Denham

"If you take foundation trusts, which will be a problem at conference, I'm absolutely convinced that if we had gone out properly and said: 'Look, we've got a problem in that the NHS is too centralised - we've got to have mechanisms that keep up the pressure for reform locally and we must give patients more choice than they have got at the moment', most people would have accepted those objectives and we would have come up with something quite similar to foundation trusts but with much wider support," he said.

Mr Denham says the government should be able to "find a way through" opposition to top up fees.

He argues that most Labour MPs would agree that higher education needs more money and it would be better to have more people going to university even if people have to make an "acceptable" contribution, than to limit the opportunities.

Happy with his lot

But, he says, most MPs are still not convinced the party has "a good enough strategy" for increasing the number of students from non traditional backgrounds into higher education.

The government might receive more support if it considered delaying the idea of differential top up fees "at this stage".

The nice thing is I don't have to worry about it - the bank manager isn't so happy though John Denham

Mr Denham says it is on these issues, and others, such as pensions and asylum, plus his home affairs committee role, that he wants to now concentrate.

He rules himself out of an imminent return to government in the near future, insisting "there is nothing worse than sitting by the phone every reshuffle hoping your name is going to come up".

"I think if you are staking out your claim to be a minister the danger is that you might censor yourself a little bit, you might say well I won't criticise how we've handled tuition fees or how we've handled foundation hospitals because it might damage my prospects," he said.

"So I think by just working on the assumption I won't be a minister, then I've got a greater freedom to do the sorts of things that I want to do.

"The nice thing is I don't have to worry about it - the bank manager isn't so happy though," he adds with a laugh.

Mr Denham confesses that he has "never really enjoyed" the party's annual conference "because I've never really enjoyed huge gatherings of people".

"By the end of the week, I'm usually feeling quite claustrophobic and wanting to go and walk on a moorland somewhere, just to get away from people," he jokes.

"The best bit about it, certainly when you get to my age and you've been going to conference for over 25 years, is the number of old friendships you are able to renew."