Election 2015: SNP Wins 56 Of 59 Seats In Scots Landslide

The SNP has recorded a historic landslide general election victory in Scotland, winning 56 out of 59 seats.

Labour has been left with just one MP in Scotland, with Scottish leader Jim Murphy, Douglas Alexander and Margaret Curran among those losing their seats.
The Liberal Democrats lost nine seats with only Alistair Carmichael holding on in Orkney and Shetland.
The Conservatives held Dumfrieshshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale – the other seat to withstand the SNP tsunami.
Senior Lib Dems Danny Alexander and Charles Kennedy also lost to the SNP.
The SNP won by 10,000 votes in Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath, which had previously been held by Gordon Brown.
And it won Glasgow North East with a record swing of 39.3%.
The result means that the SNP has recorded its most successful general election ever. Its previous best was in October 1974, when it won 11 seats. The party won six seats in 2010.

Glasgow seats

The SNP has won all seven seats in Glasgow from Labour, while former party leader Alex Salmond will be returning to the House of Commons after winning the Gordon constituency from the Liberal Democrats.
Former Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy lost his Ross, Skye and Lochaber seat to the SNP’s Ian Blackford. Mr Kennedy had held the seat for 32 years.
And former Lib Dem Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander lost by more than 10,000 votes to Drew Hendry of the SNP in Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey.
Turnout has been high across the country, with several constituencies reporting turnouts in excess on 70%, with some at more than 80%.
Electoral expert John Curtice told the BBC it was possible the SNP would win more than half of the votes in Scotland, a feat not achieved by any party since the Conservatives won 50.1% in 1955.
In East Renfrewshire, the SNP’s Kirsten Oswald defeated Mr Murphy – who had been defending a majority of 10,400 – by 3,718 votes.
The defeat will leave major questions about whether Mr Murphy can continue as Scottish Labour leader, with former Labour MP Ian Davidson – who lost his Glasgow South West seat to the SNP’s Christopher Stephens – having already called for him to resign.

Analysis by James Cook, Scotland correspondent

Is this the end of the union?
That is the question many people will be asking this morning after the party which has fought for Scottish independence for 80 years swept to victory.
The answer from the jubilant Scottish National Party leader Nicola Sturgeon is a firm “no”.
She insists that her MPs will speak for all of Scotland — not just for the 45% who voted for the country to leave the United Kingdom last September.
“This changes nothing,” Ms Sturgeon told me when I asked her about independence at the count in Glasgow, in a brief moment of calm during the nationalist avalanche.
Of course she hopes that the real answer is not “no” but “not yet”.

Mhairi Black, who becomes the UK’s youngest MP at the age of 20, overturned former shadow foreign secretary Mr Alexander’s majority of 16,600 in Paisley and Renfrewshire South to win by 5,684 votes – a swing of 27% from Labour to the SNP.
Labour’s former Shadow Scottish Secretary Margaret Curran was defeated by more than 10,000 votes by the SNP’s Natalie McGarry in Glasgow East.
Alan Brown had earlier been elected as the new SNP MP for Kilmarnock and Loudoun – which was the first seat in Scotland to declare – with 30,000 votes.
His tally was almost double that of Labour’s Cathy Jamieson, who won the seat in 2010, but was heavily defeated this time round after returning 16,362 votes.

Ms Sturgeon has arrived at the Glasgow count, where the SNP has won all seven seats

Alex Salmond will be returning to Westminster after winning in Gordon

Jim Murphy is facing calls to resign as Scottish Labour leader after losing his East Renfrewshire seat to the SNP

Mhairi Black has become the UK’s youngest MP at the age of 20 after defeating Douglas Alexander

Danny Alexander was one of the big names to lose his seat

The SNP has also gained seats including Dunbartonshire West, Falkirk, Ochil and South Perthshire, Dundee West and Edinburgh South West, which had previously been held by former Chancellor Alistair Darling, from Labour.
The SNP’s John Nicolson defeated Lib Dem incumbent Jo Swinson in Dunbartonshire East, while Marion Fellows defeated Labour’s Frank Roy in Motherwell and Wishaw.
SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, who was at the Glasgow count at the Emirates Stadium, told the BBC that Labour had been “losing the trust of the people of Scotland over a period years”.
She added: “What we’re seeing tonight is Scotland voting to put its trust in the SNP to make Scotland’s voice heard, a clear voice for an end to austerity, better public services and more progressive politics at Westminster. That’s what we now intend to do.”
Throughout the election campaign, Ms Sturgeon had been hoping to form a “progressive alliance” with other parties to bring about change at Westminster.

‘Scottish lion’

But with the Conservatives on track to be the largest party again, she insisted Labour could not blame her party for its failure to win across the UK.
Mr Salmond, who served as an MP between 1987 and 2010, said: “There’s going to be a lion roaring tonight, a Scottish lion, and it’s going to roar with a voice that no government of whatever political complexion is going to be able to ignore.
“I think it’s going to be a resounding voice, a clear voice, a united voice from Scotland, and I think that is a very good thing”.
Labour leader Ed Miliband said his party had been “overwhelmed” by a “surge of nationalism” in Scotland.
Speaking after winning his Doncaster North seat, Mr Miliband added: “I want to say to all the dedicated and decent colleagues in Scotland who’ve lost their seats that I’m deeply sorry for what has happened.
“And I also want to say that the next government has a huge responsibility in facing the difficult task in keeping our country together. Whatever party we come from if we believe in the UK we should stand up for people in every part of our United Kingdom. Because I believe what unites us is much, much more than what divides us.”

‘Federal offer’

Results from elsewhere in the UK suggest the Conservatives are on course to be the largest party, with David Cameron still hopeful of gaining a majority.
Mr Cameron said his aim was to “govern on the basis of governing for everyone” in Britain and to “bring our United Kingdom together” by implementing devolution reforms in Scotland and Wales.
He said he would pursue a One Nation agenda “if I am fortunate enough to form a government in the coming days”.
London mayor Boris Johnson, who is returning to Westminster as a Tory MP after winning Uxbridge and South Ruislip, said: “There has to be some kind of federal offer (to Scotland). Everybody needs to take a deep breath and think about how we want the UK to progress.
“I think even most people in the SNP, probably in their heart of hearts, most people who voted SNP tonight, do not want to throw away absolutely everything.”