LONDON: British Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservatives are on course to win the most seats in parliament but will be just shy of an outright majority, an exit poll showed yesterday after voting closed in a national election.
The poll put the Conservatives on 316 seats and the opposition Labour Party on 239.
The projected result could upset analyst predictions of a neck-and-neck contest between Prime Minister David Cameron and Labour challenger Ed Miliband.
It would give the Conservatives and their junior coalition partner, the Liberal Democrats, who are predicted to win 10 seats, a razor-thin majority in the 650-seat House of Commons. The exit poll also hands the Scottish National Party a historic victory, taking its tally of Scotland’s 59 seats from just six at the moment to 58.
The UK Independence Party, which has campaigned for Britain to leave the European Union and against mass immigration, was predicted to win just two seats, according to the poll, released by national broadcasters.
The combined total of 326 for the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, who have governed in coalition since 2010, indicated that Cameron should be able to stay in office.
Senior Conservative lawmaker Michael Gove said that the exit poll pointed to a clear win for his party. “If it is right, then it means the Conservatives have clearly won this election, and Labour has clearly lost it,” he told the BBC.
Agencies
