United Kingdom elections 2017: In Hung House, Theresa May will lead minority government

"Clearly if she's got a worse result than two years ago and is nearly unable to form a government, then she, I doubt, will survive in the long term as Conservative Party leader", former Conservative Treasury chief George Osborne said on ITV. May, unlike Baldwin, is not well liked amongst backbenchers, and she does not have a unifying vision for her party moving forward.

May is apparently determined to attempt to cling to power with the support of the Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party, the DUP, which has won 10 seats. A senior Conservative lawmaker, Gavin Williamson, was in Belfast for talks with the party on Saturday, a spokeswoman for May's office said.

"Theresa may or may not be the prime minister".

May called the snap election to win a clear mandate for her plan to take Britain out of the EU's single market and customs union, so she could slash immigration. But in one of the most sensational nights in British electoral history, a resurgent Labour Party denied her an outright win, throwing the country into political turmoil as no clear victor emerged.

"The people voted a year ago to leave the European Union, full stop".

On current count, with 649 seats reporting and just one left to declare, the Tories have 318 MPs, Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party has 261, and the other smaller parties hold the balance.

In the morning, instead of announcing a resignation, May rushed to the Buckingham Palace to see the Queen and said in a briefly statement shortly after that she was ready to form the government.

If Labour required the backing of the Scottish Nationalists to form a government, it would likely come at the price of another referendum.

If she is to succeed in delivering the wishes of 52 percent of the public and take Britain out of the European Union, she must find a way to secure the full support of her party to pass legislation preparing for and enacting the departure.

EU President Donald Tusk urged Britain not to delay the talks, due to start on June 19, warning that time was running out to reach a divorce deal to end four decades of membership. Speaking after being re-elected to his London seat, Corbyn said May should "go. and make way for a government that is truly representative of all the people of this country".

"The mandate she's got is lost Conservative seats, lost votes, lost support and lost confidence", he said.

Leader Jeremy Corbyn had proved his doubters wrong having secured a significant chunk of the youth vote. "I think we need to wait and see". "With a weak negotiating partner, there's the danger that the negotiations will turn out badly".

Few Europeans voiced much sympathy for May.

Love her or loathe her, the reality you and your clients face today is we now have a caretaker prime minister who clearly doesn't have the nation's confidence and has plummeted this country into more instability and uncertainty.

Though May had failed to disclosed her plans for Brexit in the run-up to the election, some commentators are saying that the "hard Brexit" that May was aiming for - a complete removal from the European single market - may no longer be possible with May's reduced authority in the House of Commons. Her predecessor, David Cameron, first asked British voters to decide in 2016 whether to leave the EU. The result ended his career and shocked Europe.

Corbyn said the result means "politics has changed" and voters have rejected Conservative austerity.

"A working government is needed as soon as possible to avoid a further drop in the pound", said ING currency strategist Viraj Patel in London. Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson - a rising star in the party - tweeted a link to a speech she made in support of gay marriage, drawing on her own experiences as a lesbian Christian.

"I don't think that's in the hearts and minds of Londoners at the minute, (not) almost as much as security is", said Sheard, 22. It was tough enough when she had her own majority.

NIA chief executive Tom Greatrex said: "This election was called to resolve the direction of Brexit but its outcome has cast serious doubt over the future".

Late in the campaign, Britain was hit by two Islamist militant attacks that killed 30 people in Manchester and London, temporarily shifting the focus onto security issues.