The Liberal Democrat cabinet minister Ed Davey has predicted his party will go into coalition negotiations with Labour after the 2015 general election.

The energy and climate change secretary suggested that Labour would be the largest party and the Lib Dems would do a better job of negotiating with them than in 2010. He made the remarks at a conference of the Social Liberal Forum, a left-leaning wing of his party, on Saturday, according to the Huffington Post.

"If we were negotiating again – and I hope we will be, but probably with the Labour party this time; that would be my prediction – I think because we are used to coalition politics we would negotiate even better," he said.

Davey suggested that last week's cabinet reshuffle by David Cameron was aimed at constricting his work as a Lib Dem cabinet minister by appointing two loyalist Conservative ministers to his department.

"He put two new ministers in from George Osborne's private fiefdom – Matt Hancock and Amber Rudd. They are really trying to shadow me and box me in. So far they have failed," he told the conference.

Nick Clegg, the Lib Dem leader, has refused to be drawn on whether he thinks the party would be more likely to go into partnership with Labour or the Conservatives again

He has repeatedly indicated his party would first negotiate with the largest party after the next election. However, the party has swung to the left and away from the Conservatives in recent months, especially by dropping their full support for the bedroom tax introduced by the coalition.

Despite the dire poll ratings for the Lib Dems, Clegg's party is still hoping to hold the balance of power in 2015 by clinging on to seats where it has incumbents.

Clegg told a BBC Radio 4 documentary earlier this year that Labour had changed for the better since the last election, while the Tories had changed for the worse. "I think there's nothing like the prospect of reality in an election to get politicians to think again, and the Labour party, which is a party unused to sharing power with others, is realising that it might have to," he said.

"There is just no doubt in my mind that if there were a Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition, we, the Liberal Democrats, would absolutely insist that government would not break the bank.

"I think the Conservative party has changed quite dramatically since we entered into coalition with them. They have become much more ideological. They have returned much more to a lot of their familiar theme tunes. I think it would be best for everybody if the Conservative party were to rediscover a talent for actually talking to mainstream voters about mainstream concerns."