Nick Eardley
Political correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

We’ve heard a lot today about how Boris Johnson has won the big fight over Brexit – and that the constitutional battle over whether we leave is coming to an end.

The Tories now have the majority they need to take the UK out of the EU next month.

But another big clash is coming – over the future of the UK itself.

The result in Scotland puts independence firmly back on the agenda and Nicola Sturgeon is getting ready to formally request powers which would allow another referendum to happen.

The SNP can now argue it has two mandates: the last Scottish election (where they said if Brexit happened against Scotland’s will the Scottish Parliament should be allow to call for another vote) and this general election.

But in a call with the Scottish first minister tonight, Boris Johnson has made it clear he will say no.

It sets up a big political clash in the coming months.

The Tories hope that by saying no they can get to the next Scottish election and deprive the SNP of majority support for indyref2 – but the SNP think London saying no will only increase support for their cause.

Laura Kuenssberg
BBC political editor

What does the election result mean? First off and most straightforwardly, it means Boris Johnson has a thumping majority.

So when MPs get back to the House of Commons he can enter the chamber as prime minister at the despatch box absolutely confident that behind him are not people looking for a way to shove him out, but people who are fully signed up to his programme, fully committed.

And that means by the end of next month, in a matter of weeks, he will have been able to get the laws required to take us out of the European Union through Parliament and that means that we are heading out of the European Union at the end on next month.

That's the biggest thing of all to say about this

Second of all, in terms of what it means for our political landscape, It means at least for the next few years probably five years we're looking at something very, very different.

We're looking at a Tory Party representing communities in places where they've never represented their voices. That's going to sound different, that's going to feel different, that's going to look different.

The bigger question though: is that a permanent shift? Has Boris Johnson really managed to redraw the map forever?

Of course in truth, as Labour has discovered to its cost today, the maps are always moving

Parties never own their voters. It's voters who have the right to be represented and the right for parties to listen to them.

After a bruising night for the DUP, in which the party lost two MPs including its Westminster leader, Arlene Foster says she is "listening" to those who felt unable to vote for them.

Click here for our full story on the DUP's election performance.

Boris Johnson has spoken tonight to Nicola Sturgeon.

No 10 has said: “The prime minister made clear how he remained opposed to a second independence referendum, standing with the majority of people in Scotland who do not want to return to division and uncertainty"

The Downing Street spokesperson added that Boris Johnson told Ms Sturgeon "the result of the 2014 referendum was decisive and should be respected”.

Ms Sturgeon has also referred to the conversation in a tweet. She said: "And I made clear that the SNP mandate to give people a choice must be respected - just as he expects his mandate to be respected.

BBC political correspondent Nick Eardley suggests there's a "big constitutional battle coming".

Radio 4 PM

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Labour MP Dame Margaret Beckett accepts a rejection of Jeremy Corbyn himself was a factor behind Labour's defeat in the general election.

"I got that on the doorstep a lot," she says on BBC Radio 4's PM programme.

"Jeremy had so much baggage and it wasn't easy baggage. He had been in Parliament for so long but without having the leadership responsibilities that makes people more cautious, perhaps, about some of things they say and do.

"Yes, there was, and unjustifiably in many cases, a rejection of Jeremy himself."

Image source, AFP

It was an election in which tens of thousands of targeted adverts from all sorts of organisations reached voters via social media.

Do target ads work? And what role do Facebook and other platforms play in the UK election?

Listen to the podcast or read our article.

BBC News Channel

Jonathan Powell, former chief of staff to Tony Blair, is asked about trade union leader Len McCluskey, who has partly blamed Labour's policies for their election defeat.

"It's quite interesting if Len McCluskey is blaming it on the policies because the Momentum defence of what happened in the election is that the problem was the policies were very popular but because of Brexit they couldn't get them across," Mr Powell says.

"If Len McCluskey is saying the policies weren't popular, that's rather contrary to what the rest of the left are saying."

BBC Radio 4

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Labour MP Dame Margaret Beckett held onto her seat in Derby South, despite losses for her party in much of Derbyshire.

Asked on BBC Radio 4's PM programme what she thought went wrong for Labour, she says that the sheer volume of information and policies coming out of the party may have proved overwhelming for some.

Dame Margaret says: "A lot of the policies were excellent and I supported them but we seemed to be trying to say something new every day.

"I understand there is a theory about how you catch the news agenda and so on but it was really confusing

"It fuelled the impression, which I don't think was accurate, of 'where has all the money come from all of this? and 'Is there no sense of priority'.

"That was harmful, unfortunately."

Ben Wright
BBC political correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

Apart from driving a bulldozer through a wall of polystyrene bricks, Boris Johnson's election campaign was restrained and sharply focused around a three-word Brexit slogan.

There was little clowning around.

The Tory manifesto contained some eye-catching offers on the NHS and police numbers but was deliberately sparse.

So, having won an emphatic mandate, what sort of Tory prime minister will Boris Johnson be?

The socially-liberal, one nation Conservative who once ran London? Or the prime minister who unlawfully suspended parliament and booted 21 centrist MPs out of the party?

Mr Johnson insists he wants to bring the country together. Tone will matter - as will policy.

Mr Johnson has won this majority on the back of once Labour-supporting seats in the north of England and Midlands.

The campaign made promises on infrastructure spending, the NHS and even state support for struggling firms that his new supporters - and MPs - will want honoured.

What about Brexit?

On Brexit, the campaigning prime minister was uncompromising: Out of the EU next month, a trade deal by the end of next year, no extension of those talks.

But just as he ditched the DUP to get a new withdrawal agreement, Mr Johnson may choose to enrage the hard-line Brexit-backers in the ERG and seek more time if he thinks a trade deal must be done.

Unlike his two predecessors he does not need to make concessions to any faction, coalition partner or insurgent Eurosceptic party.

The most mutable - and ambitious – of politicians, we'll now find out who the real Boris Johnson is.

This afternoon has seen a flurry of speeches, commentary and counter-commentary. But let's have a break from the noise and take stock of where we are.

The shape of the parties

• By 15:00, all the seats had been declared. The Conservatives achieved a majority of 80 - the party's largest since 1987.
• Labour dropped 59 seats and lost support in its traditional strongholds. At 33%, its share of the vote was down around eight points on the 2017 general election.
• The SNP increased their number by 13, giving them 48 of Scotland's 59 seats.
• Overall, the Lib Dems lost one seat, leaving them with 11.
• The Brexit Party failed to take a single seat. And the Greens held on to their one seat in Brighton Pavilion but didn't make any gains.

Click here for the full list of results.

Who said what today?

• The Conservatives' Boris Johnson said his election win will bring "closure" to the Brexit debate, telling the nation to "let the healing begin" in his first speech of this Parliament.
• Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said he did "everything he could" to get Labour into power but said the election was "taken over by Brexit".
• The Lib Dem's Jo Swinson said she was "devastated" by the result but insisted she was "proud" to have been the first woman to lead her party, adding: "One of the realities of smashing glass ceilings is that a lot of broken glass comes down on your head"
• SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon said the "overwhelming" victory of her party in Scotland "renews, reinforces and strengthens" the mandate for a second Scottish independence referendum, saying Mr Johnson had "no right" to stand in the way of indyref2.

The major casualties

Predictions for major scalps this year ranged from the foreign secretary to the prime minister himself. Both held onto their seats, but not everyone was so fortunate:

• Labour lost Bolsover to the Conservatives - a seat held by Commons veteran Dennis Skinner since 1970.
• One of the biggest casualties of the night was Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson, who lost her Dunbartonshire East seat by just 149 votes., external

• The Democratic Unionist Party's deputy leader Nigel Dodds lost his seat to Sinn Fein's John Finucane.
• Former London mayoral candidate Zac Goldsmith lost his Richmond Park seat to the Lib Dems, in the pro-Remain party's first gain of the night.
• Former attorney general Dominic Grieve, who was kicked out of the Tory party by Boris Johnson earlier this year after he backed a bill to try to stop a no-deal Brexit, lost to a Conservative candidate after he stood as an independent.

Read our full list of high-profile losers here.

What's the future for Labour and Lib Dem leaders?

• Jeremy Corbyn said he would not lead the Labour Party into the next election. It's up to the National Executive, the ruling body of the party, to decide when he would go, he said, adding it was likely a new leader would be selected in the early part of next year. (Remember, the new year is only a few weeks away.)
• Lib Dem's Jo Swinson passed on the baton to Sir Ed Davey and Baroness Sal Brinton, who will be acting co-leaders for the party. Under party rules, the Lib Dem leader must have a seat in the Commons. A leadership contest will be held in the new year.

The Guardian's political editor is reporting that Jeremy Corbyn's adviser Andrew Fisher has now left.

He tells colleagues that "whatever the failings of the party overall, you should be very proud of your work and your contribution".

In September, Mr Fisher announced he was quitting, saying he no longer had faith that Labour would be successful - but would stay until after any election.

Labour's poor election performance was down to members of the shadow cabinet undermining the party's Brexit position, as well as a "failure to apologise for anti-Semitism", says Unite union leader Len McCluskey.

In a frank article in the Huffington Post, external, Mr McCluskey says it was a mistake for Labour to offer an "incontinent rush of policies which appeared to offer everything to everyone immediately" which "strained voter credulity as well as obscuring the party’s sense of priorities".

And he criticises the "failure to apologise for anti-Semitism in the party when pressed to do so, capping years of mishandling of this question."

Mr McCluskey, whose union has donated more than £11m to the party since Jeremy Corbyn became leader, says Labour's Brexit position "could have worked" and praises Mr Corbyn’s "instinct to reach beyond the leave/remain divide" as "right and honourable".

But he says the party's position was "fatally undermined from the outset by leading members of the shadow cabinet rushing to the TV cameras to pledge that they would support 'Remain' in that second referendum come what may, never mind the 'deal'."

Turning to Labour's future, Mr McClusky says: "The next leader needs to understand the communities that gave birth to the Labour movement, and realise that the whole country is not very like Labour London.

"As important as it is, too often, Labour addresses the metropolitan wing of its electoral coalition in terms of values – openness, tolerance, human rights – and the 'traditional' working-class wing simply in terms of a material offer, as if their constituencies did not have their own values of solidarity and community."

Professor Sir John Curtice
Polling expert

We are now going to be heading for a constitutional tussle between the UK government led by the Conservatives and the Scottish government led by the SNP.

The request will be made by Nicola Sturgeon next week and she might even get a reply back - perhaps with the grace of a Christmas card - from the prime minister fairly promptly that the answer is no.

The crucial question will then be where do we go from here. The first thing to watch is going to be what happens to the opinion polls north of the border about attitudes towards independence.

We've already seen during the course of this year most polls showing an increase of support in independence around the 48-49% mark.

Most of that increase in support - virtually all of that increase in support - has occurred amongst those that voted Remain.

There is already evidence that dissatisfaction with the pursuit of Brexit has weakened to some degree the already relatively tenuous ties in public attitude in Scotland towards the union.

The question now will be: when Scotland leaves the EU with the rest of the UK what happens to public attitude?

That will be important to both sides. If indeed public opinion were to shift north of the border, so we start getting polls saying there's a majority in favour of yes.

It is very difficult to believe that a UK government that really wishes to keep Scotland in the union can regard simply saying no as an adequate answer.

It's going to actually have to think about how it manages its relationships with the Scottish government and Scottish public opinion more broadly.

Equally of course, in those circumstances, the SNP would feel further emboldened.

Beyond that, one suspects this will end up in the courts. The SNP has already given some intimation that they might try to challenge the UK government's refusal to allow them a referendum in the courts.

Image source, Reuters

Former Tory minister Rory Stewart - who left the Conservatives after Boris Johnson became PM in July and will now run for London mayor as an independent candidate - has given an interview to GQ magazine., external

He says he was surprised by how large the majority was - and says the American-style campaign strategy and style was "extraordinary".

Mr Johnson will also feel "like he's got a winning formula" with his adviser Dominic Cummings and that Mr Cummings has "delivered for him", adds Mr Stewart.

And the ex-MP also says he is "very worried" about the impact of the election on the union.

SNP's deputy leader Keith Brown says that last night saw an "absolutely emphatic win for the SNP" and "the mandate from the Scottish people is to remain in the EU".

He adds: "What we will do now... is to lodge that request for a joint section 30 agreement, that will be done next week as the first minister laid out today."

He says the Tories "massively lost here yesterday... lost hand over fist to the SNP".

Mr Brown adds: "The question really is for the Tories, are they going to continue to ignore the democratic will of the people of Scotland, that's their question to answer."

SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon earlier said Boris Johnson has "no right" to stand in the way of another Scottish independence referendum.

A section 30 order is the term for the UK government transferring the legal powers to hold a second referendum to the Scottish Parliament.

There will be a record number of female MPs in Parliament next week - but 66% of MPs will still be male.

So how do the two main parties compare?

In the Conservative Party, 76% of MPs are now male and for Labour the figure is 49%.

Out of the 26 new Labour MPs, only 23% are male, while of the new Tory MPs 65% are male.

BBC News Channel

James Brokenshire, who served as housing secretary under Theresa May, says Boris Johnson has achieved "a fantastic result" and he is "positive about what this government can do".

As well as his message on Brexit, Mr Johnson also had a "positive agenda on investing in our public services, Mr Brokenshire tells the BBC.

He adds that he hopes Mr Johnson's "One Nation Conservative" approach will now move into the issues of social justice.

Image source, Getty Images

Labour has lost its fourth general election in a row and it will soon have a new leader.

But will this be enough to get it back into government?

BBC political correspondent Iain Watson looks at the potential leadership contenders - and what they will need to do to reverse the party's fortunes.

Asked whether he regrets stepping down as a Conservative MP now the party has the biggest majority since 1987, former culture minister Ed Vaizey says he left Parliament for personal reasons "because I knew I would never get into government again".

It wasn't personal against Boris Johnson, he adds.

Mr Vaizey says it is "pretty unarguable" that Mr Johnson is an effective politician after securing such a big majority.

"Boris Johnson right now has more power than he will probably ever have again at this moment in time," he says.

"But I think he and his advisers are canny enough to know how to use that. He has a lot of authority but he also recognises... that to a certain extent he's got borrowed votes.

"He will reach out to those voters that he has newly won for the Conservatives and I think he will govern from the centre, and govern - even, dare I say it, from the centre left - because a lot of these communities who voted to Brexit... they have given their trust to Boris Johnson."

The shadow justice secretary (above) said he was "heartbroken" over the election result.

And after former cabinet minister Lord Blunkett called on his party's leadership to apologise to candidates who lost their seats, Emily Maitlis asked Richard Burgon if he wanted to say sorry to them,

Reacting to that interview, Wes Streeting said Labour's left had had "everything" it wanted, but did not get control of the electorate,The critic of Jeremy Corbyn (below) said he had warned the leader that he was a bigger problem for the party than its Brexit policy.