Unexpected majority for Conservatives as Farage, Clegg and Miliband all quit

DAVID Cameron is set to remain as Prime Minister after his Conservative Party looks set to defy all the opinion polls and win a slender majority of seats in the House of Commons.

With 604 seats out of 650 declared, the Tories are projected to win 329 seats – just three over the threshold needed for a majority government.

However it was a night of disappointment and chaos for other opposition parties.

After a bad night for Labour, Ed Miliband has officially resigned from the Party, with Harriet Harman taking over in the interim. Mr Miliband said he was “so sorry” for all his colleagues who had lost out on seats, including Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls.

Mr Balls was ousted after a recount from the Morley and Outwood constituency, losing by 422 votes.

Overall, the Liberal Deomcrats lost an astonishing 44 seats and were left with just eight MPs.

Mr Clegg said in an emotional statement to the press: “If our losses today are part-payment for every family that is more secure because of a job we helped create, every person with depression who is treated with the compassion they deserve, every child who does a little better in school, every apprentice with a long and rewarding career to look forward to, every gay couple who know their love is worth no less than everyone else’s, and every pensioner with a little more freedom and dignity in retirement, then I hope our losses can be endured with a little selfless dignity.”

In a night of high drama, two former top Liberal Democrat Cabinet ministers, Business Secretary Vince Cable and Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander lost their seats, and Labour was all but wiped out in Scotland, it was clear voters heeded Conservative warnings over the economic recovery and not believed in the credibilty of Ed Miliband’s Labour leadership.

Chancellor George Osborne, who retained his seat in Tatton, Cheshire, hailed a “great result” for the Conservatives, but acknowldged to the BBC there is a “huge challenge” to unite the nation, with the SNP winning a 56 out of 59 seats in Scotland.

It was not all good news for the Tories though, as employment minister Ester McVey lost her seat at Wirral West to Labour.

Controversial party UKIP’s leader Nigel Farage also resigned as leader of the party, after failing to gain the Thanet South, losing by around 3,000 votes. He insisted he had “never felt happier”, and a “weight [was] lifted off his shoulders.”