Rolling coverage of the 2014 European election results being announced in Britain and the rest of the EU
Ukip wins European elections with ease
Full results in the UK
All results from across Europe
3.36am BST
We're had all the results we're going to get tonight. The full Scottish results have not been announced, because the Western Isles does not count on the Sabbath, but with all the other Scottish results in, the GB numbers are fairly clear.
Here is the final state of play. I've taken the share of the vote figures from the BBC, and the seat figures from James Ball. The numbers include Scotland, even though the final Scottish results have not been officially announced.
3.14am BST
And here is the BBC estimate for the final GB share of the vote.
Ukip: 28%
3.13am BST
My colleague James Ball has tweeted his estimate for what the final number won by each party will be.
Likely national totals (incl Scotland): Con: 19 (-7) Lab: 20 (+7) Green: 3 (+1) LD: 1 (-10) Plaid: 1 (n/c) SNP: 2 (n/c) Ukip: 24 (+11)
3.09am BST
Here are the London results.
BNP: 19,246
3.00am BST
We're getting the London result now.
2.59am BST
Bored of waiting for Tower Hamlets... My best sampling estimate of Lambeth results: Lab 47%, Green 15%, Con 14%, Lib 9%, UKIP 7%, others 8%
2.55am BST
According to the BBC, Labour think they have 50% of the vote in London, and four MEPs.
In 2009 Labour got just two MEPs in the capital, and 21.3% of the vote.
2.53am BST
John Curtice, the BBC's psephologist, says he expects Labour to be about one percentage point ahead of the Conservatives by the time all the results are in.
2.50am BST
This is from Mark Littlewood, former director of communications for the Lib Dems.
If Clegg can survive the next ten days, he will lead the LDs in 2015. But it's now likely, just, that he will be ousted #Vote2014
2.48am BST
At the London count the agents have been called in to hear the results, the BBC is reporting. That means we should (please!) get a result soon.
2.37am BST
The latest word from Tower Hamlets - now the political class's least favourite borough - is that the results will be ready in 20 minutes. I'll hang on until then, but I'll wrap up soon after 3am. AS
2.32am BST
Were you still up for Tower Hamlets? Probably not, because if you've any sense, you'll have gone to bed. But the rest of us are still here because the London results are being held up by Tower Hamlets.
On Twitter, the borough is getting plenty of stick.
A rare picture of the returning officer at work in Tower Hamlets http://t.co/7OLKqqg5Rf
Now we know why Tower Hamlets has 24 hour bagel shops
And the Tower Hamlets are in and they've voted to stay IN the European Common Market
I'm old enough to remember when Tower Hamlets started counting its votes. #EP2014
Right, I've run out of crisps. This is a sign that God doesn't want me to wait up until 7am for pigging Tower Hamlets.
..3. If tower hamlets ever invites me to a pissup in a brewery I'm not going. Goodnight all.
Dear Tower Hamlets, Could you start counting the 2019 Euro elections from Tuesday so you can be sure to get them done in time? Thanks.
If Tower Hamlets are this incompetent at counting votes, just imagine how bad they must be at the other things they do...
Is there a danger that we could actually get the 2017 EU referendum before Tower Hamlets finishes its count?
2.24am BST
And here's a stark prediction from another politics academic.
Vernon Bogdanor says he thinks there is a 50/50 chance that in 5 yrs the UK will not be a member of the EU. #EP2014 #Britexit
2.23am BST
The analysts at Counterpoint have a very useful visual tool for comparing many of the populist parties that have won seats in the European parliament tonight:
JH
2.23am BST
Here's Philip Cowley, an academic and psephologist.
Whether it's second or third place, Labour's % will (almost certainly) be worst performance by HM Opposition at any Euro elex.
2.14am BST
On the BBC Martin Tod, a member of the Lib Dem federal executive, said the Lib Dems did need to do something about their leader.
What seems to be clear coming out of this is that they are not prepared to listen to our leader and that's a really serious problem.
It's a problem that I think we need to address.
Britain is a diverse country, it is a country where we stand up for civil liberties, it is a country where we recognise that our national interests are in being part of the European Union.
Someone has to have the backbone to stand up and say that. It looks like we may have paid the price but I would do it all again.
2.11am BST
My colleague Martin Kettle sums up the night so far:
The EU has never confronted a crisis of legitimacy like the one that erupted in the polling booths of Europe this weekend. From Aberdeen to Athens and from Lisbon to Leipzig, and irrespective of whether the nation is in or out of the eurozone, the 2014 European elections were an uncoordinated but common revolt against national governments and a revolt against the post-crash priorities of the European project ...
The great test of the European political class after these elections is whether they can summon the imagination to replace "more Europe" with "reformed Europe." On that, all our futures depend, to one degree or another JH
2.09am BST
Even before tonight's results were announced, some Lib Dems were calling for Nick Clegg's resignation. These results will only intensify those calls.
And those arguing that Clegg should go will probably be able to argue they have public opinion on their side. In a poll for the Sunday Times last week (pdf), YouGov asked people if they thought Clegg should resign if the number of Lib Dem MEPs were reduced to three or fewer. The results were:
2.00am BST
My colleague James Ball has sent me this on the state of play between the Conservatives and Labour.
The neck-and-neck race between the two major parties for a distant second place behind Ukip now focuses entirely on London. With almost every vote from outside the capital counted, Labour are in third place by a wafer-thin 80,000 vote margin.
Labour appear confident London's voters will help the party avoid the a third-place humiliation, but are relying on a big swing versus 2009, when the Conservative party came out 100,000 votes ahead of Labour across the region.
1.52am BST
Here is the share of the UK vote so far.
1.52am BST
Good point from Jeremy Vine on the BBC, worth the reminder: the anti-federalist, Eurosceptic, populist and far-right arrivals in the new parliament may look strong on paper, but in order to form parliamentary groups they will need 25 MEPs from seven different member states. Any number of permutations are possible, but may well prove difficult: many of these parties are united only by their dislike of Brussels, and will find it very hard to work together. As Vine says, the hard right is looking "ragged and fragmented" JH
1.47am BST
Tory sources are claiming that Labour has been doing very badly in some of its target seats. In North Warwickshire (Labour's number one target, they say), Stroud (number 16 on the target list), Gloucester (38th on the target list), Erewash (42nd on the target list), Swindon (South Swindon is 55th) and Peterborough (78th on the target list), Labour apparently came third, behind the Conservatives and Ukip. AS
1.40am BST
On the BBC the newly-re-elected Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan is arguing for some kind of electoral understanding with Ukip. He says he accepts that a formal pact is not going to happen. But he suggests that some kind of informal non-aggression deal (my phrase, not his) could operate in particular constituencies. The Conservatives used to be in a pact with the National Liberals, he says. And in 1951 the number of National Liberal MPs supporting the Conservatives was larger than Winston Churchill's majority, he says.
He says he's worried that, without an understanding of this kind, the Eurosceptic vote could split, and Labour could win the election. He would not object to Ed Miliband winning with majority support, he says. But it would be unfair if the will of the people were frustrated by the workings of the first-past-the-post system.
1.34am BST
On the BBC John Curtice, the psephologist, says that Labour's vote has gone up in London by more than it has in the rest of the country.
Curtice: "now obtained results for 9 councils in London. Lab vote is up by 14 points, up on 9 point increase in the rest of country."
Curtice: "A particularly large increase in the UKIP vote appears to have hurt the Tories more than Labour."
Curtice: "Where UKIP's vote is up by 15 points or more since 2009 the Con vote is down on average by 4 points..."
Curtice: "...In councils where the UKIP vote is up by less than 10 points the Tory vote is down by just 1 point."
1.29am BST
Here is the European parliament's latest projection of the breakdown of seats in the new parliament JH
1.29am BST
Patrick Wintour and Nicholas Watt are reporting Labour predicting that, when all the final results are assembled, they will be on 25.7%, with the Tories on 24.5 % and the Green party in fourth place.
1.26am BST
According to the BBC, the London results are being delayed because there has been a problem counting votes at Tower Hamlets. AS
1.25am BST
My colleague Ben Quinn has been speaking to the Green party leader, Natalie Bennett. She is saying that the Green party is gaining votes from disaffected Lib Dem voters.
It's very clear around the country that we are consistently beating the Liberal Democrats. It's also very clear that their position on Europe and on social issues has costs them dearly, she said, speaking from the count centre for the London constituency.
Bennett added that the issue of fracking had also led to large numbers of Lib Dem voters, and even Tories, going green, a trend which she predicted would continue.
1.19am BST
My colleague Severin Carrell has sent me more on Ukip gaining a seat in Scotland.
In a result which has stunned the Scottish National party, Ukip has won its first ever seat in Scotland by taking 139,687 votes, knocking the Scottish Green party into fifth and the Liberal Democrats into sixth.
After 31 of Scotland's 32 councils declared - the Western Isles are due to declare on Monday, the SNP failed to win the three seats they had fought for but still won the popular vote by taking 386,193 votes.
1.17am BST
We are still waiting for results from London, which we will get tonight. Northern Ireland is counting tomorrow. And almost all the Scottish results are in - enough to know that Ukip has won a seat - but we won't get the final Scottish results until tomorrow, when the Western Isles results get announced.
But nine regions have declared. Here is the state of play so far. AS
1.16am BST
Martin Schulz, the social democrat German president of the European parliament and would-be president of the European Commission, had this to say on the Front National's victory in France:
Its a bad day for the EU when a party with such a racist, xenophobic and anti-semitic programme gets the majority. But this is not the only country [where this is the case]. Pro-European parties have to take very seriously what lies behind this vote People have lost trust and hope JH
1.01am BST
And here are the results from the South East, where Nigel Farage has been elected.
Elected: Daniel Hannan (C), Nirj Deva (C), Richard Ashworth (C),
Anneliese Dodds (Lab), Catherine Bearder (LD), Keith Taylor (Green),
Nigel Farage (UKIP), Janice Atkinson (UKIP), Diane James (UKIP), Ray
Finch (UKIP)
1.00am BST
Want to see what France's 23 front National MEPs look like?
Click here and apply the Front National filter (thanks, Contexte).
12.55am BST
Here are the West Midlands results.
Elected: Philip Bradbourn (C), Anthea McIntyre (C), Neena Gill (Lab),
Sion Simon (Lab), Jill Seymour (UKIP), James Carver (UKIP), Bill
Etheridge (UKIP)
12.49am BST
This is interesting.
#UKIP result might have been even stronger - splinter "An Independence for Europe" took 2% in most regions
12.47am BST
Nigel Farage, the Ukip leader, has been elected as an MEP in the South East region.
In his acceptance speech, he says it is just about the most extraordinary result in 100 years.
12.46am BST
12.36am BST
Nigel Farage said that tonight's results could lead to Nick Clegg's resignation.
We may well see one party leader forced out of his position as a result of tonight, we may see another party leader have to completely reconsider the idea they won't promise a referendum at the next general election and I suspect the prime minister will face calls from his own party for a much tougher negotiating stance.
12.31am BST
Lizzy Davies sends the latest from Rome:
The night shows no sign of getting any less spectacular for Italian PM Matteo Renzi, who badly needed a blessing by these polls given the way in which he took power earlier this year in what his critics branded a "palace coup".
On the fourth projection for Rai, his centre-left PD is on 41.8%. Beppe Grillo's anti-establishment Five Star Movement is on 21.6%. Berlusconi languishing on 16.3%.
12.29am BST
The governing Fidesz-Hungarian Civic Alliance and its much smaller partner, the Christian Democratic Peoples party (KDNP), won 51.5% of the vote in Hungary's European elections, marginally down on their result in 2009, reports Politics.hu but ultranationalist, hard-right Jobbik finished second on 14.7%. The Hungarian Socialist party (MSZP) plummeted to 10.9%, its worst result in any nationwide election since 1990 and a sharp fall on the 17.4% it scored five years ago JH
12.29am BST
Here are the results for the North West.
BNP: 32,826
12.23am BST
Britain has gone Ukip purple, according to the BBC.
12.14am BST
Here are some more snaps from the Press Association with local results from the UK.
Ukip came top at Torridge in South West of England with 8,011 votes; Conservatives second (5,706); Green party third (2,233); Labour party fourth (1,669); Liberal Democrats fifth 1,596.
Ukip came top at Teignbridge in South West with 13,358 votes; Conservatives second (11,912); Green Party third (4,659); Liberal Democrats fourth (4,497).
12.14am BST
Grant Shapps, the Conservative chairman, told the BBC that voters were using the elections to take a "free hit" at the political class.
People are fed up and they want to see more action, particularly on Europe ... But in a year's time it is certainly anything but a free hit ... I don't think you can do much read across between these elections and next year's.
12.09am BST
My colleague Henry McDonald has sent me this from Ireland.
Sinn Féin's European candidate for Dublin Lynn Boylan has won the seat for her party, it was confirmed at the count in the city's RDS centre tonight.
A government minister for the ruling Fine Gael party Brian Hayes is expected to take the next Euro seat in the Irish capital.
12.08am BST
Ukip have won a seat in Scotland, my colleague Severin Carrell tells me. AS
12.08am BST
Finnish exit polls show the National Coalition and Centre parties holding their three European parliament seats each, reports the euobserver, but with a score of 12.7% albeit less than some had predicted the Eurosceptic Finns party doubled its number of MEPs to two JH
12.05am BST
With results in from six regions in the UK, here are the overall figures so far:
UKIP
11.58pm BST
My colleague Severin Carrell says that in Scotland Ukip has now got more than 100,000 votes.
So @Vote_UKIP breaks 100k barrier, taking 109,945 votes. After 27 councils, SNP 307k; Lab 274k; Cons 195k; Greens 81k and LD 72k #EP2014
11.57pm BST
Exit polls in Polands European parliament elections showed the pro-European Civic Platform party of prime minister Donald Tusk in first place with 33% of the vote, but as in other parts of the EU a Eurosceptic party, the New Right, did better than expected, finishing fourth with 7.2% of the vote, writes Remi Adekoya in Warsaw.
A survey carried in April this year showed 89% of Poles support their countrys membership of the EU, but the result for Janusz Korwin-Mikkes New Right showed there was considerable political capital to be gained in Poland from attacking the EU.
Civic Platform edged out their biggest rivals, Law and Justice, by 1%, but the biggest winner of the day was Korwin-Mikke whose partys result shows there is "a significant group of Poles who hate the EU and everything it stands for, said Wojtek Szacki, political analyst at Polityka Insight, a think-tank.
11.50pm BST
The centre-right People's party narrowly beat the Socialists in Spain's European elections, writes Ashifa Kassam in Madrid, in a result Spanish media called a "punishment" for Spain's two dominant political parties. The two mainstream parties together lost more than 5m votes against the 2009 election results, with the governing People's party winning 16 EP seats, eight fewer than 2009, and the Socialists 14, down nine. But, says Ashifa:
The big story of the night was the many smaller parties, who earned the votes of two out of every five Spaniards. Newcomers Podemos (We Can), a political movement that emerged from Spain's indignados, earned 7.9% of the vote, enough for five seats in the European parliament.
"We can't talk about the end, but we can talk about the beginning of the end of bipartisanship. We have to throw them out because they're the one who have ruined the country," Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias told journalists on hearing the results. The leftwing coalition United Left increased their seats from 2 to 6 while the Union, Progress and Democracy went from 1 to 4 seats.
11.49pm BST
And here are the results for Wales.
BNP: 7,655
11.45pm BST
Here are the results for the South West.
Elected: Ashley Fox (C), Julie Girling (C), Clare Moody (Lab), Molly
Scott Cato (Green), William Dartmouth (UKIP), Julia Reid (UKIP)
11.44pm BST
Lizzy Davies in Rome sends her take on events there so far:
Italy's under-secretary for European affairs, Sandro Gozi, said earlier this month that a victory for the prime minister's centre-left Democratic party would be winning "one more vote" than Beppe Grillo's rambunctious Five Star Movement.
If the initial projections are to be believed and that's a big 'if', as they are still based on a very small share of the vote Matteo Renzi and his PD will certainly be able to claim victory.
11.40pm BST
The detailed results for the East Midlands and forYorkshire and Humber are now in. You may have to refresh the page.
11.39pm BST
Europes mainstream is set to receive yet another shock, writes the Guardian's Leo Cendrowicz in Brussels, from an unlikely source: Belgium:
Sundays vote showed that the Flemish nationalist N-VA party, which calls for an independent Flanders, is now Belgiums biggest party. The result marks the first time a member states poll is topped by a party seeking to split the country itself and is likely to add to the European Parliaments unstable mix of anti-establishment parties aiming to undermine the conventional order.
The N-VA won 18.4% of the national vote, up 13.3% from 2009. It finished comfortably ahead of its nearest rivals, the Flemish Christian Democrat CD&V at 13.2%. The Flemish liberal Open VLD came third with 10.9% (up 2.3%) while the Francophone Socialist PS of Prime Minister Elio Di Rupo managed only 8.8% (down 4.9%).
11.32pm BST
Here are the results for Yorkshire and the Humber.
BNP: 20,138
11.31pm BST
Le Monde notes that if the Front National's victory was not surprising, the scale of it certainly was: a five-point gap between the FN and the conservative UMP, which managed 20.3% against nearly 28% in 2009 compared to the FN's 25%:
In the space of five years, the parties' relative strengths have radically altered: the FN, which won 6% of votes in 2009, has quadrupled its score; the UMP has fallen back by seven percentage points.
With 14.7% of votes, the governing Socialist party arrives, as expected, in third place. If it has lost support compared to the last European elections (16.5% of votes in 2009), it has not fallen below its lowest ever score of 14.5% in 1994 JH
11.23pm BST
Here are the results from the East Midlands.
BNP: 18,326
11.17pm BST
Well, sort of. Philip Oltermann in Berlin has news of:
A minor scandal on the margins of tonight's electoral earthquake. Giovanni di Lorenzo, editor of Germany's leading weekly newspaper Die Zeit, no less, admitted on German TV that he had cast two votes he has both German and Italian passports, and voted once at his local primary school, and once at the Italian consulate. Casting two votes in the European elections is, of course, illegal, as Wolfgang Schäuble, one of the other guests on the show, pointed out JH
11.13pm BST
Here are some more snaps from the Press Association. AS
Labour came top at Bristol in South West region with 30,517 votes; Ukip second (25,700); Green party third (21,916); Conservative fourth (21,105); Liberal Democrats fifth 11,216.
Conservatives topped Cotswold in South West region with 10,863 votes; Ukip second (6,865); Liberal Democrats third (3,063); Green party fourth (2,254).
11.11pm BST
Grant Shapps, the Conservative chairman, is on the BBC. He is saying the Conservatives will reintroduce the backbench bill legislating for an in/out EU referendum in 2017 and he challenges the other parties to support it. (In the last session of parliament they didn't, and it failed to be passed because it ran out of time.) AS
11.04pm BST
As expected, the mainstream, pro-European Social Democrats and Christian Democrats maintain their comfortable majority but the anti-federalists, Eurosceptics and far right have made major advances. Courtesy of AFP's graphics department.
INFOGRAPHIC: The new European Parliament #EP2014 @AFPgraphics pic.twitter.com/U61sodUkB7
11.00pm BST
My colleague Severin Carrell has tweeted this from Scotland.
17 #EPScot councils declared: @theSNP 210,091, @scottishlabour 180,602, Tories 130,613, @Vote_UKIP 74,173, Greens 57,922, LD 46,724 #EP2014
Ukip might edge the race for the sixth Scottish seat, Peter Kellner suggests. Looks pretty tight to call that either way
10.59pm BST
Here are more snap results from the Press Association.
In an early declaration for a Welsh council area, Tories narrowly pipped Ukip in the votes for Pembrokeshire with 9,250 to 8,965. Labour had 6,808 and Plaid Cymru 3,824.
Ukip came top at South Derbyshire in East Midlands with 8,406 votes, Conservatives second with 7,092 votes, Labour third with 5,675, Green Pparty fourth 1,064.
10.54pm BST
Nigel Farage, the Ukip leader, has said his party is on course to win and that this will be "an earthquake because never before in the history of British politics has a party seen to be an insurgent party ever topped the polls in a national election." AS
10.48pm BST
The full results from the UK: East of England have now been posted on the blog. AS
10.48pm BST
Courtesy of Le Point, which notes that only in the country's Ile de France and Western regions did Marine Le Pen's party fail to finish first JH
#LePointLive La carte des résultats en France. En marron, les victoires du #FN. #EP2014 pic.twitter.com/jRgFIZNUeU
10.43pm BST
Nick Griffin has used his Twitter account to concede that he has lost his seat in the European parliament.
If anyone can tell me how to change my twitter title without losing the account I'd be obliged! ;-) #we'renotgoingawayyouknow
Only real change is a paycut in 6 months time and that I'll have more time to spend campaigning in Britain. #BNP
10.40pm BST
Here are more snaps from the Press Association.
Ukip are topping the poll in constituencies all over England, they show.
Ukip topped the poll in Rotherham - where the party had success in Thursday's local elections - with 27,949 votes. Labour were second with 23,299. The Tories were on 7,472 and Lib Dems were on 1,343, behind the BNP and Greens.
Ukip came top at North West Leicestershire in East Midlands with 7,955 votes, Conservatives second with 6,180 votes, Labour third with 5,234, and Green Party fourth with 1,140.
10.38pm BST
This is significant.
Ukip was ahead of Tories in Newark and Sherwood District which covers much of the Newark constituency where a parliamentary by-election is pending. A council source said the party was first with 10,027 votes against 9,641 for Tories and 6,601 for Labour.
10.36pm BST
I'm posting the UK results as they are announced on TV. But I've now updated the North East results with the full details from the Press Association. To read them, you may need to refresh the page.
As the night goes on, I will continue to post the full details as they come in in the block where I posted the snap findings. This will make it neater. But you may have to refresh the page to get the updates to appear. AS
10.33pm BST
Maddy French, the Guardian's correspondent in Vienna, has the Austrian results:
The race to top spot between the two major parties in Austria was won by the conservative Austrian People's party (ÖVP) who got 27.3% of the vote, beating their coalition partners the Social Democrats (SPÖ) who ended with 24.2%.
But as predicted, Heinz-Christian Strache's far-right Freedom party (FPÖ) made significant gains, ending on 20.5% (+7.8 on 2009) despite changing their top candidate just weeks before the election following a scandal over racist remarks.
10.32pm BST
Here are the results for the East of England region
BNP 12,465
10.24pm BST
AFP reports that the Front National's success in the European elections is:
a personal triumph for Marine Le Pen's attempts to detoxify the image of the party and remove the taint of racism and anti-Semitism. But polls also suggest that many voters remain profoundly suspicious of the party and it is hard to calculate the 'protest' element of Sunday's vote.
Pundits in Paris are saying the main lesson of the vote is that France is moving towards a three-party system in which the FN will go toe-to-toe with the centre-right, opposition UMP and President François Hollande's Socialists. Marine Le Pen meanwhile has summed up her analysis of what the result means: "Our people demand only one type of politics - a politics of the French, for the French and with the French" JH
10.22pm BST
Here are some PA snaps from the UK. Results are counted locally, but the regional results do not get announced until all the results in the region have been collated.
Leeds - the first council result to be announced in the Yorkshire and Humber region - had Labour topping the poll with 60,483 votes. Ukip came in second with 50,627, the Tories 34,626, Greens on 17,231 and Lib Dems fifth with 11,756.
Conservatives came top at East Cambridgeshire council in Eastern region with 6,692 votes. Ukip were second (6,553 votes), Labour third (2,552), Liberal Democrats fourth (2,303) and Greens fifth (2,106).
10.17pm BST
Here are the results for Britain's North East constituency.
BNP: 10,360 - 2% (down 9 points)
10.17pm BST
Lizzy Davies in Rome reports that the polling booths have finally closed in Italy and the first exit polls are out. Unlike many other European countries, Lizzy warns, exit polls in Italy are "notoriously unreliable", so much so that SkyTG24, the rolling news channel, has said it is not running any, preferring to wait for projections. All that said:
An exit poll for Rai has prime minister Matteo Renzi's PD on 30.5%-33.5%, ahead of the Five Star Movement on 26-29%. Berlusconi's Forza Italia is on 16.5%-19.5%. Another exit poll, for La7 has the PD on 33%, the M5S on 26.5% and the FI on 18% JH
10.12pm BST
Ian Traynor, the Guardian's Europe editor, says British Conservative Struan Stevenson has told him the party "has already passed the seven-country threshold for keeping the ECR bloc" and is "confident of increasing it". But David Cameron's main ally in the parliamentary group, Poland's PiS, is likely to supplant the Tories as the dominant force in the bloc with 19 seats JH
10.09pm BST
Ukip have won in Canterbury, the Ukip Canterbury account claims.
10.07pm BST
This is from ITV Wales's political editor
Senior Labour figure predicts Welsh vote share as Labour 32%, UKIP 29%, Conservative 19%, Plaid Cymru 17%
10.06pm BST
Rather belatedly, I'm afraid Greece's radical leftist, anti-bailout and anti-austerity Syriza party has won the country's EU election by a margin of nearly four points over prime minister Antonis Samaras's New Democracy party, Reuters reports quoting official exit polls:
Syriza took 26.7% of the vote, ahead of the conservative New Democracy which took 22.8%, the interior ministry predicted. The Socialist PASOK party's Olive alliance secured 8.1%, with the far-right Golden Dawn finishing third with 9.3%.
The EU ballot marks the first major electoral test for Samaras since he came to power two years ago and has turned into a de facto referendum for his fragile right-left coalition, which is clinging to a two-seat majority in parliament JH
10.04pm BST
Phil Taylor, a former Labour special adviser, isn't impressed by the Labour spin.
@politicshome: Labour source says it is looking as if UKIP is ahead, but party has "exceeded expectations> 2nd is exceeding expectations?!
10.00pm BST
It's 10pm. And the BBC is now reporting the results of the exit polls on the continent.
9.59pm BST
But Labour is also briefing that its result is "up significantly" on the 15.7% it achieved in 2009, according to the Press Association. AS
9.58pm BST
Nick Robinson on the BBC says Labour are privately saying they think Ukip has won. AS
9.57pm BST
The European parliament has produced a projection for the make-up of the parliament. European parliamentary groups must be made up of 25 MEPs from at least seven member states, and there will be a great deal of horse-trading particularly among the newly reinforced Eurosceptic parties, many of which will struggle to work together before things settle down in the new parliament. But as things stand, the parliament could look like this:
EPP: European People's party (Christian Democrats) 211MEPs, 28.10 %
9.57pm BST
The last time a party other than Conservative or Labour won the most votes in a national election was 1906 - Michael Thrasher #skyelections
9.56pm BST
I posted the GB polling figures earlier so we can see later which polling organisation got closest to the result.
We'll also be able to see how accurate predictions made by punters were. AS
Here were the closing betting lines on European election vote shares: UKIP 28% Lab 26% Con 23% LD 8% Green 8%
9.54pm BST
Helen Pidd has sent me this from Manchester.
The Green party is hopeful of sending its first MEP from the north-west region to Brussels. In 2009, their lead candidate, college lecturer Peter Cranie, lost by 0.3% to Nick Griffin from the British National party. Five years ago, I lost to Nick Griffin and the next day I was made redundant. It was the worst 24 hours of my life, said the 42-year-old on Sunday evening in Manchester town hall.
The Greens made impressive gains in the north-west in last week's local elections and hope they can replicate the success at a European level. Ten out of 60 councillors on Lancaster city council are now Green (a gain of two); in Liverpool they are now the official opposition to Labour after winning two more seats to add to their existing two; and they won their first seat in the Wirral on Thursday too. That's in addition to their one councillor on Lancashire County Council. The party is keen to point out it now has more councillors in the region than Ukip.
9.46pm BST
Turnout in the UK was 36%, according to the European parliament.
That is up from the 34.7% in 2009. But it is behind the 38.52% figure for 2004, which is when turnout hit its highest in the UK for a European election. (All-postal voting was being piloted in some areas then, I seem to remember.)
The turnout tomorrow will be the highest weve ever seen for a European election. Why? Because people who have not voted for years or never voted in a European election will go out tomorrow and vote Ukip.
@AndrewSparrow Turnout was artificially inflated in 2004 by the all postal voting experiment in 4 English regions.
9.44pm BST
The victory of Marine Le Pen's anti-immigrant, anti-European Front National the party's first in a national election has shaken France's political establishment to the core. Kim Willsher in Paris sends some reaction:
Manuel Valls, the Socialist prime minister, described the result as a very serious moment for France and Europe ... This result is more than another warning: its a shock, an earthquake.
The opposition UMP president Jean-François Copé sought to put a brave face on the result: "It's above all a huge disappointment, but it's also the expression of the French's people's immense anger and exasperation over François Hollande's politics," Copé said. "We (the UMP) were more divided in the European elections. This worried some of our voters."
9.38pm BST
My colleague Philip Oltermann in Berlin sends this on Germany's recently-formed anti-euro party, Alternative für Deutschland:
AfD, which is calling for the common currency to be dissolved, performed strongly in its first European elections, though not quite as strongly as previous polls had indicated: with between 6.8% and 7.1% of the vote, they should end up with up to seven MEPs.
Bernd Lucke, the head of the AfD said tonight he wanted to sit with the Tories in the alliance of European Conservatives and Reformists, a move that would put strains on David Cameron's relationship with Angela Merkel. In an interview with German news channel ZDF, Lucke said he would not enter an alliance with Ukip, because their idea of European politics is completely different to ours.
9.35pm BST
Exit polls show Eurosceptics on both sides of the political divide seeing gains in the Swedish European elections, europeonline magazine reports.
The anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats are on track to win their first seat with 7% of the vote, while the the radical Feminist Initiative party also captured one of Sweden's 20 parliamentary seats with 7% of the vote, the SVT exit poll said.
9.27pm BST
My colleague Severin Carrell has sent me this from Scotland.
The key question in the Scottish region for the European elections is whether the Scottish National party can win a morale-boosting three seats out of the six up for grabs, only a week before the official campaign period for the independence referendum starts.
The SNP, which comfortably won the most votes in the 2009 European elections with nearly 30% against 21% for Labour, currently holds two seats, with Labour also on two, and the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats on one apiece.
9.24pm BST
At 43.11%, turnout across the continent this time around has barely changed from the last elections five years ago, the European parliament has announced.
As in 2009, too, the highest turnout was highest in Luxembourg at 90% where voting is obligatory and lowest in Slovakia (13%) JH
9.17pm BST
On the continent, they've got exits. But in the UK we are still reliant on the opinion poll conducted before the election.
There is a full list of all those polling reports at UK Polling Report.
Pollsters' Final Euro Calls Round Up [CHART] http://t.co/w8B5GbHeD9 pic.twitter.com/p4a6LyQogJ
9.12pm BST
The Guardian's correspondent in normally sensible Germany, Philip Oltermann, writes with news of Europe's only purely satirical party, Die Partei,
which has gained a respectable 0.5% in some exit polls. Run by journalist and comedian Martin Sonneborn, the party's full title is "The Party for Work, Rule of Law, Animal Rights, Support for Elites, and Basis-Democratic Initiatives". Its motto, promoted in a series of absurdist videos, is "Yes to Europe, No to Europe" JH
9.07pm BST
The reason we have to wait until 10pm for the UK's results is because polling booths in Italy do not close until 11pm, Rome time. As the Guardian's Italy correspondent, Lizzy Davis, writes:
So, as we all know, the Italians are still voting. The country is waiting to see who will win out in the two-horse race between prime minister Matteo Renzi's centre-left Democratic Party and the anti-establishment Five Star Movement led by Beppe Grillo.
One voter for the latter appears to have done what you're definitely not supposed to, and taken a video of his vote inside the booth. (La Repubblica reports that, having put it on Facebook, the Grillino has since removed it.)
"To change this country, the first thing to do is this," he says, crossing the circle of the M5S and writing the names of his preferred candidates. "This is not a protest vote," he declares at the end, "but a vote for honesty and legality."
In a few hours we'll know how many other Italians did the same JH
9.00pm BST
I have not got the names of the candidates elected yet, but here's a Democratic Audit chart from earlier naming the candidates.
8.58pm BST
There was a suggestion on Twitter earlier that Lord Ashcroft would be releasing an exit poll at 10pm.
But he isn't.
@JamieMcBastard @MrHarryCole I am not releasing an exit poll
8.55pm BST
The Guardian's Ireland correspondent, Henry McDonald, says early tallies from the count in Dublin suggest Sinn Fein will top the poll in the Irish capital, making it a successful weekend for the party in the Irish Republic. The ruling party Fine Gael should also secure a seat in Greater Dublin. Irish Labour, which has had a torrid couple of days having seen its vote more than halve in local elections, is also set to lose its European seat in the city.
Henry adds:
In the Republic the elections are far less about European issues than simply giving the government of the day a kicking at the polls. This election has been about anger over austerity cuts (albeit imposed by the IMF and the bankers at the European Central Bank in Frankfurt), the imposition of new taxes including water rates and the widespread belief that Irish bankers have not paid the price for their greed during the Celtic Tiger boom years.
8.54pm BST
My colleague Helen Pidd is at the count in Manchester. She's sent me this.
Outside Manchester town hall, a dozen or so protesters are waving "Nick Griffin must go" placards and shouting "Nazi scum" at four people wearing the British National party's red, white and blue rosettes smoking cigarettes in Albert Square.
Griffin is widely expected to lose the seat he won in 2009 after polling 132,094 votes (8% of the total) in the north-west region. He has applied for accreditation for the Manchester count, but has not yet arrived.
8.50pm BST
Angela Merkel's conservatives are topping the exit polls in Germany with a projected 36%, Reuters reports. The Social Democrats (SPD) who share power with the CDU in a 'grand coalition' in Germany, but oppose the centre-right at EU level, were projected to take 27.5%, the poll by public broadcaster ARD suggested. The new Eurosceptic party Alternative for Germany (AfD) was on track for 6.5%, an advance on the 4.7% it scored last September in parliamentary elections JH
8.49pm BST
My colleague Helen Pidd is at the count in Manchester. She's sent me this.
Outside Manchester town, hall a dozen or so protesters are waving "Nick Griffin must go" placards and shouting "Nazi scum" at four people wearing the British National party's red, white and blue rosettes smoking cigarettes in Albert Square.
Griffin is widely expected to lose the seat he won in 2009 after polling 132,094 votes (8% of the total) in the north-west region. He has applied for accreditation for the Manchester count, but has not yet arrived.
8.47pm BST
For the record, here are the GB European election results from 2009.
Conservatives: 27.8% (25 seats)
8.42pm BST
8.33pm BST
A Danmarks Radio exit poll in Denmark indicates the populist, Eurosceptic Danish People's party is in course to beat prime minister Thorning-Schmidt's ruling Social Democrat party, winning 23.1% of the vote against the SD's 20.5%. The Liberal party is third with 17.2%. The Danish People's party has confirmed talks with the UK conservatives on forming joint a political group in the EP, euobserver reports JH
8.18pm BST
The Guardian's Remi Adekoya in Warsaw has just sent provisional exit polls from Poland: the pro-European ruling party Civic Platform looks ot have won the day with 33% of the vote, while the more euro-critical, conservative Law and Justice party is in second place on 32%. (The fiercely anti-EU New Right, whose leader Janusz Korwin-Mikke has said that if his party won seats in the European parliament they would put the parliament building to better use by turning it" into a "whorehouse", won 7.2%) JH
8.13pm BST
Marine Le Pen has appeared on stage in front of cheering Front National supporters and given an initial reaction to her party's victory:
The people have spoken. Our people demands one type of politics: they want French politics by the French, for the French, with the French. They don't want to be led any more from outside, to submit to laws. The sovereign people have proclaimed loud and clear...that they want to take back their destiny into their own hands. We must build another Europe, a Europe of free and sovereign nations and freely decided cooperation. Tonight is a massive rejection of the European Union. What is happening in France signals what will happen in all European countries; the return of the nation.
8.09pm BST
The Guardian's Paris correspondent, Kim Willsher, has sent this from the jubilant headquarters of the Front National just outside Paris:
From the beginning of the European election campaign Marine Le Pen was insistent that Sunday evening would finally see the Front National emerge Frances number one party. Election pundits scorned her pretentions; the opinion polls confirmed them.
As the first exit polls were announced at 8pm on Sunday, cheers and a rendition of La Marseillaise broke out among the party faithful gathered at the FN headquarters in the Paris suburb of Nanterre, appeared to prove Le Pen right.
8.09pm BST
With two hours to go until the British results start coming out, there's time for some background reading.
Here are three particularly useful items about the elections.
8.04pm BST
All eyes will be on the performance of a bewildering array of parties from right, left and centre lining up to welcome the votes of all who feel, for whatever reason, disaffected, disillusioned or otherwise fed up with the European Union and/or its present policies.
Polls ahead of the vote suggest these anti-Brussels mavericks who range from progressive socialists through nationalist populists to unreconstructed neo-fascists, and from hardcore Europhobes (who want out of the EU altogether) to much softer "eurocriticals" (who are merely campaigning for a looser, lighter bloc) may win up to 30% of the 751-seat parliament.
7.47pm BST
You won't have seen an exit poll from the UK European elections, even though polls closed on Thursday night. That's because under UK law publishing them before voting has finished in the rest of the EU is not allowed.
But in other European countries they're not so scrupulous. People are still voting in some countries, but a series of exit polls have already come out.
#EP2014 - Ireland - RTE exit poll for Dublin: SF 24% FG 14% GRN 14% FF 12% Childers (independent) 11% LAB 8%
#EP2014 - Germany - the Infratest dimap projection in seats: pic.twitter.com/R3WeCF7NHs
#EP2014 - France Ipsos projection: pic.twitter.com/VLQyXeXNW1
Exit polls being reported in Germany but UK media can't report them until all polls close. Looks like classic bit of UK gold plating
The far right anti-EU National Front was forecast to win a European parliament election in France, topping a nationwide ballot for the first time in a stunning advance for opponents of European integration.
Critics of the European Union, riding a wave of anger over austerity and mass unemployment, gained ground elsewhere but in Germany, the EU's biggest member state, the pro-European centre ground held firm, according to exit polls.
In France, Marine Le Pen's nationalist movement which blames Brussels for everything from immigration to job losses, was set to take about 25 percent of the vote, comfortably ahead of the conservative opposition UMP on about 21 percent.
Continue reading...