PM set for return to Downing Street with 368 seats for the Tories and 191 for Labour

This article is more than 9 months old

This article is more than 9 months old

Boris Johnson is on course to secure a thumping Conservative majority, immediately sparking fierce recriminations within Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party.

Both major parties were shocked by a 10pm exit poll, which suggested the Conservatives would win a decisive majority. That was borne out through the night, as seat after seat in Labour heartlands turned blue.

The result appeared to mark a dramatic repudiation of Corbyn’s offer of “real change” for Britain.

The Labour leader said at his Islington North count that he would not lead his party into another general election, but would remain in place during what he called a “period of reflection”.

He insisted Labour’s manifesto had been “extremely popular”; but that it had been overshadowed by Brexit.

Play Video 1:41 Jeremy Corbyn says he will not lead Labour into another election – video

A string of seats across Labour’s so-called “red wall” were seized by the Tories. Darlington in County Durham and Workington in Cumbria fell to the Conservatives, as did the former mining constituency of Blyth Valley, in Northumberland, which had beenheld by Labour since its creation and was No 116 on the Tory target list.

There was also a significant redrawing of the electoral map in Scotland, with the Lib Dem leader, Jo Swinson, losing her East Dunbartonshire seat, as the SNP made significant gains.

The party’s leader, Nicola Sturgeon, said the result, which also saw it take seats from Labour, meant the prime minister “must accept that I have a mandate to offer Scotland the choice of an alternative future”.

Play Video 0:54 Nicola Sturgeon filmed celebrating Jo Swinson's defeat to SNP's Amy Callaghan – video

Johnson, speaking at his own count in Uxbridge, said: “This one-nation Conservative government has been given a powerful new mandate to get Brexit done – and not just to get Brexit done but to unite this country and to take it forward.”

He is now expected to push his Brexit deal through parliament, with a second reading before Christmas – exploiting his new-found freedom to operate without the support of the DUP and the ERG.

As the scale of the defeat began to sink in, staunch Corbyn loyalists were quick to blame Brexit for the party’s performance – while others pointed the finger at the leader’s personal unpopularity.

The former Labour cabinet minister Alan Johnson said: “It’s Corbyn. Jeremy Corbyn was a disaster for Labour – everyone knew that he couldn’t lead the working class out of a paper bag.”

Appearing with Jon Lansman, the founder of the pro-Labour group Momentum, on ITV, Johnson said: “I want this cult out of the party. I want Momentum gone”.

Play Video 'I want Momentum gone': Alan Johnson slams Labour left – video

The shadow chancellor, John McDonnell appeared pale and shocked when confronted with the poll on the BBC. Asked whether he and Corbyn would stand down if it proved accurate, he said: “We will see the results in the morning and decisions will be made then.”

There were few bright spots for Labour, but in a rare gain the party took Putney, a remain-voting seat in a wealthy part of the capital.

The exit poll was updated as the night went on, and by 4am was projecting that Labour would be left with 201 seats, against 357 for the Tories.

Gareth Snell, the Labour candidate for Stoke-on-Trent Central, said he expected to lose his seat. Asked whether Corbyn and John McDonnell should resign, he said: “Yes”.

Snell argued that Labour had made a mistake in failing to support Theresa May’s Brexit deal – because it had listened to the “siren voices” of some in the shadow cabinet with remain constituencies. “We could either have stopped the Tories, or stopped Brexit,” he said.

The Labour leader caved in to pressure from party members and promised another referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU – but candidates in many Labour-held seats in the party’s heartlands warned that it risked alienating their constituents.

Jess Phillips, the candidate for Birmingham Yardley, who has been a longtime critic of Corbyn, urged furious party members to channel their feelings at the expected result – and appeared to hint that she may be considering a leadership bid. “I understand, I feel pain, take that anger you feel and know it has to be fuel. Maybe not tonight but tomorrow,” she tweeted.

Play Video 1:24 'Extremely disappointing': John McDonnell admits shock at election exit poll – video

McDonnell has been a key figure in Labour’s shift towards supporting a second referendum. He had been expected to put himself forward as a potential interim leader, but is likely to face questions about his role in masterminding the party’s election campaign.

One senior shadow cabinet minister said of both McDonnell and Corbyn: “They have to go.”

Caroline Flint, who lost her Don Valley seat to the Tories, said: “Those influential Labour figures living in north London postcodes” should accept that “Labour cannot simply be a party of big cities and university towns, or just a party of the young.”

Labour also lost Sedgefield to the Tories. Phil Wilson, who had represented Tony Blair’s former seat since 2007, appeared emotional as he said it would be difficult for the party to re-establish a bond with the voters.

“I genuinely believe that the Corbyn leadership is the issue in this election and to say that it isn’t is delusional,” he said. “Brexit is an issue but for every one person who raised Brexit on the doorstep with me, five people raised the leadership of the Labour party. But it isn’t just Jeremy Corbyn, it’s his worldview – they don’t see him as being patriotic, they see him as being anti-west.”

He said Corbyn should take a “long hard look at himself and what he’s allowed to happen to the Labour party”

The Conservatives led Labour in the polls since late October, when Corbyn decided to accept Johnson’s demand for an election; but several had shown a modest narrowing as the six-week campaign drew to a close.

Labour had sought to focus its campaign on the impact of nine years of austerity on public services, and the risks to the NHS of a trade deal with Donald Trump’s White House.

Even senior insiders fretted that the party’s strategy was not as clear as in 2017, and the manifesto, titled “Time for Real Change”, was so crammed with giveaways it was hard to discern an overall theme.

Some Labour candidates in marginal seats complained they were left exposed by their party’s decision to fight an attacking strategy, pouring resources into Conservative-held constituencies in the hope of winning a governing majority.

The Tories ran a relentlessly focused campaign repeatedly pressing home their “get Brexit done” message.

