Election 2017 live updates: Theresa May claims Conservative government supported by DUP will provide 'certainty'
The Independent will be bringing you all the live updates as the UK's next government is formed
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Your support makes all the difference.Theresa May has said she will form a Conservative government backed by the DUP, claiming it can bring "certainty" to the UK.
After visiting the Queen, the Prime Minister claimed there was a "strong relationship" between the two parties, amid concern over the DUP's controversial anti-abortion and anti-LGBT policies.
The PM has also apologised to Conservatives who lost last night. She said: "I'm sorry for all those colleagues who lost their seats." She will "reflect on what we need to do in the future to take the party forward" after the result, she added.
The UK voted for a hung parliament after shock losses for the Conservatives in the 2017 general election. With 649 of 650 seats declared, the Tories had 318 seats - eight short of the figure needed to win outright - with Labour on 261, the SNP on 35 and Liberal Democrats on 12.
Jeremy Corbyn's party increase its share of the vote by 9.6 per cent, while the Tories were up 5.5 per cent, the Liberal Democrats, Greens and SNP saw small loses and Ukip's vote collapsed.
The live blog has now ended
Politicians, voters, and even their pets have been heading to polling stations and are posing for the cameras at every opportunity.
The Prime Minister has made clear that she would rely on the support of the Democratic Unionist Party in order to get her programme through Parliament, despite concern over its stance on issues including equal marriage, abortion and climate change.
Making no allusion to losses suffered by the Conservatives, Ms May said she intended to press ahead with her plans for Brexit.
She faced calls from within her own party to consider her own position after the election, which she brought forward by three years in the hope it would deliver an increased majority in the Commons.
Jeremy Corbyn urged her to resign and allow him to form a minority administration, declaring: “We are ready to serve this country.”
But, after intensive talks with the DUP, the Prime Minister instead drove the short distance to Buckingham Palace to ask the Queen for permission to form a new government.
The final election results came in late on Friday, after Kensington finally declared a Labour win — with a tiny 20-vote majority. They were:
Re-posting this one from earlier today.
David Davis appears to concede that the Tories have lost their mandate to leave the single market and customs union
Brexit Minister David Jones has said he supports Theresa May but that it is “impossible to say” if she would still be Prime Minister in six months' time.
Asked if Ms May would still be in Downing Street at the end of the year, Mr Jones told BBC Wales: “That's impossible for me to say, and is probably impossible for anyone else to say too.”
Pressed on how long she would stay PM, Mr Jones said: “That remains to be seen.”
PA
Former Northern Ireland peace negotiator Jonathan Powell (Sky News)
Jonathan Powell, Tony Blair's former chief of staff and a Northern Ireland peace negotiator, has spoken out against Theresa May's plans to govern with the help of the DUP.
He told Sky News: “I spent 10 years doing the Northern Ireland peace negotiations and I really would appeal to the Government not to go down this path.
“Since 1991, when a Tory Secretary of State for Northern Ireland said that Britain would be neutral in Northern Ireland — not take the side of the unionists, not take the side of the nationalists, that we had no strategic selfish interest in Northern Ireland — we now find ourselves taking sides.
“How on Earth are we going to mediate between the unionists and the nationalists when we're trying to establish government? We have a political crisis there. Do you really want to make the political crisis worse just so the Government can stagger on?
“Even John Major at his weakest, when he was really struggling in the House of Commons, did not go into an alliance with the DUP because he did not want to be depending on the DUP and finding himself unable to be even-handed in Northern Ireland.
“We will not be seen as even-handed if we find ourselves in coalition or in support of the DUP, or 'our friends in the DUP', as Prime Minister May has put it.”
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