Labour's Steve Rotheram has been re-elected as Liverpool metro mayor.

The city council has shared the full breakdown of the results.

Conservative MP Lee Rowley has been speaking to the BBC, and says voters in places such as Hartlepool will see benefits of the government's "levelling up" promises.

"I represent a red wall seat... we've seen some great opportunities come to North East Derbyshire" and that experience is "reflected all across the country", he says.

A government white paper on levelling up is due in the autumn.

Labour's Vaughan Gething, health minister in the Welsh Government, tells the BBC with the party "having done so well we don't have to look at a formal coalition".

"We do, however, have to talk to other groups within the Senedd," he adds.

With all but four seats to be allocated, Labour have 30 of the Senedd's 60 seats, which Mr Gething calls a "strong mandate to govern".

Following the 2016 election Labour had 29 seats and governed in coalition with the sole Welsh Liberal Democrat member.

Good afternoon. If you're just joining us, here's a quick re-cap on the current state of play:

• The Conservatives are up in the English council elections, while Labour has lost control in some of its former strongholds
• The possibility of an outright SNP majority in the Scottish Parliament is still finely balanced, but they are likely to have a working majority in Holyrood, with the support of the Scottish Greens
• Labour has done well in Wales and stays in government in the Senedd. The party has said they "don't have to look at" a formal coalition
• Labour's Steve Rotheram has been re-elected as mayor of the Liverpool City region, and Norma Redfearn has been re-elected as mayor of North Tyneside
• Results in several English city mayoral elections are expected later today
• Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has said defeats suffered by the party are "bitterly" disappointing.

Norma Redfearn has been re-elected mayor of North Tyneside, with 53% of the vote.

And in the Liverpool City Region mayoral race, Steve Rotheram has also been re-elected, with 58% of the vote.

Elizabeth Glinka
Political Editor, BBC Midlands

It's a very tight race for the West Midlands mayor, but there's still a possibility that Conservative incumbent Andy Street will win on first preferences.

He started the race by seeking to put distance between himself and central government, but as the Conservative's popularity became clear, he began to emphasise his access to No 10.

For Labour, not getting into a second round would be a huge blow. Liam Byrne, a former cabinet minister, was thought to be a strong candidate. But Labour's support is centred in metropolitan Birmingham, which unlike the Black Country and the rest of the region, didn't have council elections alongside the mayoral vote this week, which isn't going to boost their turnout.

We should get a result this afternoon.

Image source, .

You can find the result in your local area by using our postcode checker.

The SNP's Kate Forbes says her party's number one priority is "steering the country" through the Covid crisis - but once the pandemic is over there should be an independence referendum.

The SNP looks set to be the biggest party in the Scottish Parliament but may not secure an overall majority.

It has argued there should still be a pro-independence majority in the Parliament including the Scottish Greens - but Prime Minister Boris Johnson has rejected calls for another referendum.

Asked whether it is a responsible use of taxpayers money to fight for a referendum in the courts if it is rejected by the Westminster government, Forbes says she hopes it doesn't come to that.

"If anything ended up in the courts it was because Boris Johnson dragged us to the courts," she adds.

Welsh Liberal Democrat leader Jane Dodds says it’s "much too early to say" whether she would accept an invitation to be part of the next Welsh government.

The party lost their constituency seat in Brecon and Radnorshire but won a list seat in Mid and West Wales with Ms Dodds heading for the Senedd.

She will not be drawn on any future arrangements in an interview on BBC Radio Cymru and says no-one from Welsh Labour has been in touch.

“I need to speak to other people within the party and we shall have to see…there are other results to come in," she says.

With 52 of the 60 seats declared, Labour is on 30 - one short of a majority - with the Conservatives on 12, Plaid Cymru nine and the Liberal Democrats one.

Sam Francis
BBC News, London

Image source, EPA

The first results of the Greater London Authority (GLA) election appear to show a similar picture to 2016.

Electors confirmed the first seven members of the 25-member London Assembly - no constituencies changed hands.

To recap, the GLA is responsible for passing or rejecting the mayor's budget, scrutinises the mayor's key powers, and grills their picks for top jobs such as the chair of Transport for London.

• What does the London Assembly do?

Membership of the London Assembly is split - with eleven members representing the whole capital and 14 elected by constituencies.

Labour saw three new London assembly members elected, replacing previous Labour representatives in the constituencies of North East, Brent and Harrow, and Lambeth and Southwark.

And the Conservatives held the constituencies of West Central, along with Bexley and Bromley, and Havering and Redbridge. While Labour held Ealing and Hillingdon.

You can find all the latest results in London here.

Labour may not have done enough to take West of England mayoralitypublished at 12:09 British Summer Time 8 May 2021

12:09 BST 8 May 2021

Paul Barltrop
Political Editor, West of England

They’ve been counting the votes here in Bristol since 09:00 this morning. We’re expecting a result for the West of England mayoral election sometime early this afternoon - if it goes through to the second round of counting - because you get two choices with this election.

This really was a target for Labour – leader Keir Starmer came down here campaigning with their candidate, Dan Norris, three times.

Labour reckoned they had a good chance. The Conservatives won it last time around, which was the first time it was up for contest, in 2017.

So the Conservatives are in essence the incumbents, albeit with a new candidate this time around.

But talking to the parties over the past day or so, there’s a sense that perhaps Labour haven’t quite done enough, which of course would fit in with the pattern around much of the rest of the country.

Joanne Anderson has been elected as the city mayor of Liverpool.

Confused?

As our political reporter Claire Hamilton explains here, Liverpool City Region mayor was a role created as part of a devolution deal for five Merseyside councils - Liverpool, St Helens, Sefton, Knowsley and Wirral - plus Halton, which is in Cheshire.

Image source, PA Media

If you're just joining us, welcome. It's a bumper set of elections, so you'd be forgiven for being a little overwhelmed.

First, here's who is being elected:

Here's how to get up to speed:

• Check what the results are in your area here
• Read Laura Kuenssberg's analysis on what the results mean so far

• Check out the latest results across England, Scotland, Wales and London
• Follow along on the BBC News Channel - or just hit the play button at the top of this page.

If you're interested in England:

• Read our main story on more results coming in as the Conservatives make significant gains
• See the results as they come in around London
• And the results around England here.

If you're interested in Scotland:

• Check out the results in maps and charts
• Read the story so far here
• And follow along live.

If you're interested in Wales:

• Take a look at the key maps and charts
• Read our main story on Labour being set to stay in power
• And follow along live.

And of course, stick with us here on the live page where we will pull together the results from across the three nations.

Labour to move more staff out of London after election lossespublished at 11:45 British Summer Time 8 May 2021

11:45 BST 8 May 2021

Iain Watson
Political correspondent

We expect some better results for Labour later on today - in Greater Manchester and London.

But, nonetheless, they’re a long way off. The results were even worse than they had predicted themselves, worse than their internal polling was telling them.

The scale of Labour’s challenge is huge.

In terms of responding to it, there’s going to be a review of their policies - something former Labour minister Lord Mandelson has been calling on Keir Starmer to do.

As I wrote back in February, that work has already been going on informally.

The details are going to emerge in the next few weeks but that process will give Starmer an opportunity not just to move away from the 2019 manifesto - with which Labour lost the general election very badly - but also some of the pledges he made when he was standing to be Labour leader, which were designed to appeal to the left of the party.

I’m also told there’s going to be more organisational changes too – moving more staff out of London into the regions, to the areas where they’ve been losing seats. And they’re also going to be reviewing their data and polling operations as well.

Leftwing Labour MP Clive Lewis, asked by the BBC if party leader Keir Starmer is in trouble, says: "He's in trouble, we're all in trouble."

"It's not just the Labour Party that's in trouble, progressives are in trouble", he says, with left-of-centre voters "fragmented" in the first-past-the-post electoral system.

The Conservative have reorganised themselves and "they are smashing us", he says.

Asked how Starmer can win back lost voters, Mr Lewis says the party should "be authentic, say what we think, and set out a vision".

"This politics by focus group - what you think people want to hear - go out and make the argument, stand by your principles, your vision and your values and go out and argue them. Don't just say 'what do you think?'," he says.

After the overnight hiatus, results have started to come in again in Scotland.

The SNP's Gillian Martin has held Aberdeenshire East with a reduced majority of 1,889 over the Scottish Conservatives who increased their vote share by 11%.

The Lib Dems were third with a 10% in drop in their vote share compared with 2016.

Voting showed a swing of 6.1% from the SNP to the Tories.

Turnout was 64%, up 8.7%.

You can see the full results here

Red Rotherham turning a shade of bluepublished at 11:06 British Summer Time 8 May 2021

11:06 BST 8 May 2021

James Vincent
Political Editor BBC Look North

Pretty incredible stuff is coming out of Rotherham.

Before yesterday there were no Conservative councillors in the town.

There are 15 of them today and they’ve not finished counting.

Fourteen wards out of 25 were declared yesterday, the rest will be announced today.

Labour has 18 councillors so far.

I’m not sure the Conservatives will be able to take control of the council because there are some strong Labour areas to come in, such as Maltby and Swinton.

The town elected its first ever Rother Valley Conservative MP in 2019 - that trend seems to be continuing.

It’s going to be fascinating to see how the wards around the area's steelworks vote, especially with the uncertain future there - plus those that used to be pit villages. Some have already declared, more to come.

BBC Radio Sheffield

Talk about a close race - one council ward in Barnsley, South Yorkshire, had to be decided on a coin toss after the candidates tied.

Both the Labour and Conservative candidates in the Rockingham ward got 1,084 votes.

After voting recounts returned the same result, Labour won - with tails.

It's not the first dead heat in this set of elections - yesterday the Conservatives took control of Northumberland County Council by drawing lots out of a box when two candidates tied.

Thumping endorsement for Welsh Labour leadershippublished at 10:56 British Summer Time 8 May 2021

10:56 BST 8 May 2021

Ione Wells
Westminster Correspondent, BBC Wales

Image source, PA Media

For Wales, do not "see England".

Labour were preparing for a defensive campaign against the Tories - particularly in some of Wales’s north-east "red wall" seats they lost on a UK level in 2019 - but defend they did.

They lost just one seat to the Tories in Vale of Clwyd by a very fine margin and comfortably held on to their others.

They also won back Rhondda from Plaid Cymru with a huge swing and held on to Llanelli, which went from the most marginal seat in Wales to a sizeable majority over Plaid after some strong local ground game.

They’ve won 30 seats, which is effectively enough to govern in a parliament of 60, and have therefore matched their best ever result. A thumping endorsement of Mark Drakeford and Welsh Labour’s leadership throughout the pandemic.

The Tories gained two constituencies and have overtaken Plaid Cymru in second place. Depending where the final regional seats go they could be in for a chance for their best result ever by increasing their vote share in places - a solace after not making any significant gains from Labour.

For Plaid Cymru, this result is disappointing. They increased their share in safe seats, though lost share in their leader Adam Price’s. And their former leader Leanne Wood is out of the Senedd.