CONSERVATIVE leader David Cameron urged Prime Minister Gordon Brown to call a general election in the wake of Labour's disastrous by-election defeat in Scotland today.
The party lost the previously safe seat of Glasgow East to the Scottish National Party with a swing of more than 22%.
Speaking outside his home in west London, the Tory leader said: "I think the Prime Minister should have his holiday but then I th
ink we need an election.
"I think we need change in this country, and that's how change should come about."
Mr Cameron said he was pleased the Conservative candidate Davena Rankin went from fourth place to third place and "maintained" the party's share of the vote.
"But what I wonder is whether we can put up with this for another 18 months," he said.
"I think whenever people have had a chance to speak about this Government, whether at the local elections, whether in Crewe, whether in Henley, whether in the London mayor elections and now in Glasgow, they have said 'Look, we think you're failing and we want change'.
"I think it's the Conservative Party over the last few months that's really been setting the agenda on things like how we combat knife crime, how we deal with the cost of living, how we clean up politics.
"And so I look forward to going on and setting that agenda and fighting that election whenever the Prime Minister calls it."
Mr Cameron said he was pleased the Conservative candidate went from fourth place to third place and "maintained" the party's share of the vote.
"But what I wonder is whether we can put up with this for another 18 months," he said.
"I think whenever people have had a chance to speak about this Government, whether at the local elections, whether in Crewe, whether in Henley, whether in the London mayor elections and now in Glasgow, they have said 'Look, we think you're failing and we want change'.
"I think it's the Conservative Party over the last few months that's really been setting the agenda on things like how we combat knife crime, how we deal with the cost of living, how we clean up politics.
"And so I look forward to going on and setting that agenda and fighting that election whenever the Prime Minister calls it."
Senior Cabinet minister Des Browne admitted the result was "a bad night" for Labour, but he defended Mr Brown.
Defence Secretary and Scottish Secretary Mr Browne said: "Clearly, this has been a bad night for us and we will take it seriously."
Labour candidate Margaret Curran paid the price for a national mood on economic circumstances, he told BBC Radio Scotland's Good Morning Scotland.
"Time and time again, people raised the issue of rising food and fuel prices," he said.
The loss of Labour's third safest seat in Scotland will create new doubts at Westminster over the Prime Minister's future.
The result, if repeated at a general election, would see Mr Brown lose his seat, along with a slew of Cabinet ministers.
The result came in the early hours, after Labour's insistence on a recount led to the SNP's majority being increased by 11 from an initial 354.
The victorious SNP candidate, John Mason, and his party leader Alex Salmond said they had achieved a "political earthquake" and the tremors would be felt "all the way to Downing Street".
But International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander insisted Mr Brown should not bear sole responsibility for the disastrous defeat.
He said voters had been expressing "frustration" over the global economic slowdown and issued a plea for unity from mutinous MPs.
"If you want me to say it is a bad result, it is a bad result," he told the BBC. "I don't think it is a night to say it is about one particular individual.
"I would ask them to reflect on the time when I joined the Labour Party, which was 1982, not in the heady heights of New Labour's success, but at a time of repeated and bitter defeats for the Labour Party.
"We learnt a very serious lesson at that point, which is that divided parties lose."
The full article contains 706 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
