BROWN DEFIANT DESPITE POLLS DEFEAT

The Prime Minister brushed aside questions about the future of his own leadership in the wake of a Tory victory which saw a solid Labour majority of 7,000 turned into a nearly 8,000 majority for the Conservatives.

Mr Brown insisted that the scale of the defeat - coming hard on the heels of Labour's drubbing in the May 1 local government council elections - reflected voters' concerns about the state of the economy.

But a jubilant David Cameron claimed the campaign marked the "end of New Labour" and declared his intention to build his own "broad coalition" to carry the Tories to victory at the general election.

Mr Brown, who made a show of carrying on with business as usual with a visit to meet staff at a London hospital, said the voters had "sent a message" about their concerns over rising fuel and food prices.

"The task that I have set for myself is that we take this economy through difficult times into a future where we have both fairness for all and prosperity for the British people," he said. "That is the challenge I am going to meet for the British people."

Mr Cameron said Labour had paid the price for running a "backward-looking and divisive" campaign, in which they had focused heavily on the background of the Conservative candidate, Edward Timpson, branding him a "Tory toff".

"It was in many ways the end of New Labour. I think it was a great mistake," Mr Cameron told reporters as he left his west London home to make a triumphal appearance in Crewe.

Shadow chancellor George Osborne accused Labour of resorting to "personal class war attacks" and "dog whistle" politics on immigration.

"Labour under Gordon Brown has abandoned the centre ground," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. "There is a new 'nasty party' in British politics and it is the Labour Party."