Sebastian Payne

The Tories are already putting some clear blue water between the coalition and the present majority government. Firstly, the new Business Secretary Sajid Javid has promised new tougher strike laws — ensuring that a minimum turn out of 50 per cent turnout is required for all strikes, while 40 per cent of all members will need to back a strike affecting essential public services. The TUC's Frances O'Grady has already hit back, arguing the new rules will make 'legal strikes close to impossible'. Secondly, Theresa May and David Cameron are promising to tackle our ‘passively tolerant society’.

Jim Messina is the American elections guru who got the general election right. Hired by the Conservatives as a strategy adviser in 2013, the Tories hoped he would emulate Barack Obama's 2012 re-election strategy. And so he did. Whereas British pollsters consistently missed that the Tories were moving into pole position, Messina’s internal numbers showed for weeks they were on course to be the largest party. Speaking to The Spectator from Washington, D.C, he reveals that he was not at all surprised when the BBC exit poll showed the Tories were going to trounce Labour. ‘We predicted 312 seats that morning to Lynton [Crosby] and 316 was right in line with that, so it just kind of validated what we’d been seeing,’ he says.

In this View from 22 podcast special, James Forsyth, Isabel Hardman and I discuss the final appointments in David Cameron's new Cabinet and what they show about Cameron's approach to party management. We also discuss David Miliband's brutal interview about his brother's term as Labour leader and why Nigel Farage has decided to hang on as leader of Ukip.

The shock election result has resulted in a lot of finger pointing. Why did the pollsters not see a Tory victory on the horizon? Was Labour deluded in thinking they had any chance of making it into government? Judging from conversations I've had with Conservatives, those inside the party weren't particularly certain about getting the most seats either, never mind a majority. The leadership campaigns were even prepped for a contest soon after May 7. But there was one man who did see a Tory victory coming: Jim Messina. The Obama guru and former White House deputy chief of staff was hired by the Tories for his data nuance and his substantial salary was clearly worth it.

All of the results of the 2015 general election are in and we have a result: the Conservatives have a major of 12 seats. Here is a breakdown of the results for each of the parties: [datawrapper chart="http://static.spectator.co.uk/PifSa/index.html"] And a few other figures you might find interesting: Turnout was 66.1 per cent, up from 65.1 per cent in 2010 19.4 per cent of MPs in the new parliament will be female, up from 15.

The polling stations open in under 10 hours and the final opinion polls are out. As we've seen throughout this campaign, there's not much variance at all, with all of the pollsters putting Labour and the Tories tied — or with a small lead within the margin of error.

David Cameron’s 72-hour tour of Britain has finished up in the north west this afternoon. I have followed the Prime Minister to two campaign 'events' this afternoon — both purely for photo opportunities and neither involved meeting any ordinary voters. By this point in the campaign, knocking on doors is probably not the most effective use of time, so the best Cameron can hope for is to look enthused and feature in some colourful snaps. His first major event of the day was at a building site at Chester Zoo, in the heart of the Northern Powerhouse. A new tiger pen is being constructed,  an ideal opportunity for the Prime Minister to point at rocks and piles of mud.

In today’s election special podcast, Fraser Nelson, James Forsyth, Isabel Hardman and I discuss David Cameron’s election rally with Boris Johnson in Hendon and whether the Mayor of London has been underused during the campaign. We also look at how David Cameron has proven, yet again, to be the essay crisis Prime Minister — showing his passion just in time for polling day. Plus, we discuss how Ed Miliband has surpassed all expectations during the campaign.

If Nick Clegg loses in Sheffield Hallam, it would be the Portillo moment of the 2015 election. After several tight polls, a new survey from ICM this evening suggests that the Lib Dem leader might be safe after all. When the names of candidates are prompted, ICM puts Clegg on 42 per cent — seven points ahead of the Labour candidate Oliver Coppard on 35 per cent. Without promoting by candidate name, ICM has Labour taking the seat, narrowly ahead by two points on 34 per cent. This is a rather different outlook to the one painted by Lord Ashcroft, who reported in his most recent marginal poll that Labour was on 37 per cent and the Liberal Democrats on 36.