London // Prime minister David Cameron’s Conservatives won a surprise victory in Britain’s general election, which dramatically redrew the political map and could redefine the country’s future in Europe.
Widespread predictions of a close contest proved wide of the mark as the Conservatives won 331 of the 650 seats seats in the House of Commons.
The opposition Labour party finished second with 232 following a rout in Scotland, where the Scottish National Party (SNP), took all but three of the 59 seats.
The leaders of Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the anti-EU UK Independence Party (Ukip) all stepped down after suffering major losses in Thursday’s voting.
Following his own re-election in Witney, near Oxford, Mr Cameron travelled to Buckingham Palace, where he was reconfirmed as prime minister by Queen Elizabeth II.
Bringing an end to five years of coalition government with the Liberal Democrats, he announced in Downing Street: “I will now form a Conservative majority government.”
The result is an endorsement of the Conservatives’ austerity programme and is likely to see a continuation of cuts to public spending as they seek to reduce a budget deficit of nearly £90 billion (Dh511bn).
The pound rallied and stocks rose as investors welcomed a clear result and a “business-friendly” government.
Mr Cameron’s pitch to voters was that he had rescued Britain from economic crisis to deliver the fastest growth among major economies. He had warned that Labour leader Ed Miliband would cripple the United Kingdom by giving Scottish nationalists the keys to England’s treasure.
Mr Miliband, a self-confessed socialist “geek”, had argued that the recovery was benefiting the rich and most people were still worse off. But he failed to connect with working class voters or convince the public he could be trusted with the world’s fifth largest economy.
But after an election that exposed deep political divisions and the nationalist landslide in Scotland, Mr Cameron avoided triumphalism and promised to “bring our country together”.
He paid tribute to Mr Miliband and to his former deputy prime minister, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg, who both stepped down after dismal results.
The Conservative victory means Britain will face a referendum which Mr Cameron has promised by 2017 on continued membership in the European Union. He says he wants to stay in the bloc, but only if he can renegotiate Britain’s relationship with Brussels.
In Scotland, the extraordinary scale of the nationalist landslide victory reopened the question of the future of the United Kingdom less than a year after Scots voted in a referendum to remain inside it.
Scotland will send just three representatives of traditional British parties to the UK parliament in London and its dominant nationalists will be locked out of the British cabinet, arguments separatists could use to seek a new vote to leave.
Scottish politicians elected to parliament in London have historically held major cabinet posts.
Mr Cameron sounded a conciliatory note towards Scotland, likely to be his most immediate headache, promising further devolution of powers to a Scottish government.
“In Scotland, our plans are to create the strongest devolved government anywhere in the world with important powers over taxation,” he said.
Alex Salmond, the former leader of the Scottish nationalists who was elected to parliament from the north-eastern seat of Gordon, called the SNP’s victory “an extraordinary statement of intent from the people of Scotland”, saying, “The Scottish lion has roared this morning across the country.
“The SNP are going to be impossible to ignore and very difficult to stop.”
Mr Salmond handed over leadership of the party to Nicola Sturgeon after the failed independence referendum in September.
Most of the SNP’s gains were at Labour’s expense – in Paisley and Renfrewshire South, 20-year-old student Mhairi Black defeated Labour’s campaign chief to become Britain’s youngest MP since 1667.
Overall Labour lost about two dozen seats, for which Miliband said he took “absolute and total responsibility”, before standing down as party leader.
It was also a terrible night for the centrist Liberal Democrats, who lost all but eight of their 57 seats as voters punished them for entering a government with Mr Cameron.
Mr Clegg held his seat but resigned the party leadership, saying: “The results have been immeasurably more crushing than I could ever have feared.”
The election result raises questions over Britain’s future in the EU, as Cameron confirmed in his victory speech, promising: “We will deliver that in-out referendum on our future in Europe.”
He has previously said he would campaign to stay in the bloc, provided he can secure changes to Britain’s terms of membership, notably on freedom of movement – although this has so far been met with resistance in EU capitals.
“Cameron will very quickly have to come to Brussels and negotiate a settlement,” said Sara B Hobolt, a European politics professor at the London School of Economics.
The premier made the referendum promise in large part to counter an electoral challenge from the anti-immigration Ukip, which has campaigned for Britain to leave the EU.
In the event, Ukip lost one of its two parliamentary seats and its leader Nigel Farage quit after failing in his seventh attempt to become an MP. However, the party surged into third place in the overall vote tally.
Mr Farage, a charismatic former commodities trader credited with making a fringe party into a major force, said he might seek the party leadership again later this year.
One other loser is the opinion polling industry which is likely to face an inquest over its failure to predict the outcome. Before the election, virtually all opinion polls had shown the Conservatives and Labour neck-and-neck.
* Agence France-Presse and Reuters