The loss of Andrew Adonis as schools minister will be a “huge blow” to academies, potentially resetting priorities for the next phase of the state-funded independent school programme, according to education officials and academy sponsors.

Insiders reacted with “shock and dismay” after discovering Lord Adonis would be moving to transport and giving up his role running academies – a programme he conceived under Tony Blair and administered with near “monastic devotion” for some five years.