Supporters and opponents alike have acknowledged that the alternative vote would never be introduced for Westminster elections after the proposal received a thumping defeat in the national referendum.

With 439 of the 440 voting areas counted, the no campaign had established a lead of 68% to 32%, another wounding blow to Nick Clegg, whose Liberal Democrats had secured a referendum as one of their cherished prizes in negotiations with the Conservatives to form the coalition last year.

Matthew Elliott, campaign director of No to AV, said: "Tonight's result is an emphatic victory, a clear signal from every part of the country that people want to keep our simple, fair and effective system for electing MPs. I believe this result settles the debate over changing our electoral system for another generation."

Chris Huhne, the Lib Dem energy secretary and prominent campaigner for a yes vote, accepted that there would be no further attempt to introduce voting reform during this parliament and that it was "over" for AV. But he suggested that another question on electoral reform might one day be put to the electorate.

"I think it is very clear that the people have spoken, that the alternative vote is not a runner and we must respect that decision."

But voters had not expressed an opinion on proportional representation, he said. "The question on the ballot paper was 'Do you support AV?' and we must respect that."

The former Labour cabinet minister Lord Reid, a no campaigner, said the public had delivered a resounding rejection of AV and warned the Liberal Democrats not to look for any "backdoor" introduction of voting reform. "Anyone who now wants to find some sort of backdoor method to bring something in that is not first past the post will be seen to have snubbed the clear wishes of the electorate," he said.

"The British constitution is not some bauble to be handed out as a consolation prize. It would be an outrage if such a resounding vote was to be ignored by the Liberal Democrats."

Nick Clegg called on fellow electoral reformers to "get up, dust ourselves down and move on" as he and David Cameron, a partner in the coalition but an opponent during the campaign, absorbed the result of the referendum that had become so central to the government in its first year in office.

The Electoral Commission said a total of 19.1m votes were cast across Great Britain, giving a provisional turnout of 42%, higher than many had predicted. Only a few voting areas came out with a majority for a yes vote, including Cambridge, Glasgow Kelvin, and the London boroughs of Camden, Haringey, Islington, Lambeth and Southwark.

London, as predicted, had a relatively low turnout in a year where there were no other elections. But in Scotland, where voters were also electing members of the Scottish parliament, turnout reached 50.7%.

A spokesman for the yes campaign said: "Clearly it is a very disappointing day for us. We're very proud of the campaign we ran but we acknowledge that the overarching political circumstances of the country meant we couldn't get the message across. it is difficult to sell a solution when the British people don't see a problem."

There is an assessment that being associated with the Lib Dems was toxic and as soon as Cameron got involved, it was game over for the yes campaign. Some campaign managers have tried to ease unhappiness in the team by saying that it was a credit to them that Cameron felt he had to get involved. But they described the prime minister as a "game changer".

Labour's Lord Mandelson, a keen supporter of electoral reform, said: "I think that's very disappointing, but I'm equally entirely unsurprised by it. Nobody could have foreseen the extent to which the whole vote over the last 24 hours has become a referendum on the Liberal Democrats in general and Nick Clegg in particular.

"We paid a big price for combining the AV referendum with the first elections to be held after the general election last year."

He was critical of how the yes campaign had been run. "The groundwork was not done for this referendum. I think that the public felt the thing had come out of the blue as the result of some arrangement between the coalition partners and they didn't see why AV was such a big deal.

"I don't think they felt AV was the solution to many of the problems they feel are in our political system."

Results at a glance





323 of 440 districts declared

Yes 31.6% 3,905,343 votes

No 68.3% 8,427,622

Scottish parliament (seats)

SNP 69 (+23)

Labour 37 (- 7)

Conservative 15 (+ 5)

LibDem 5 (- 12)

Other 3 (+ 1)

Welsh assembly

Labour 30 (+4)

Conservative 14 (+2)

Plaid Cymru 11 (– 4)

LibDem 5 (– 1)

Other 0 (– 1)

English councils

With 238 of the 279 councils declared, results so far are:

Conservative 131 councils (+5) 4,015 councillors (+56)

Labour 54 councils (+24) 2,130 councillors (+711)

LibDem 8 councils (– 9) 898 councillors (– 599)