Angus Robertson has held the Moray Parliamentary seat at the UK General Election in emphatic fashion.
The result was announced at 3.10am – but the writing was on the wall for several hours as the votes were being stacked on the Elgin Town Hall stage.
Mr Robertson polled 24,384 votes – up from 16,273 he polled in winning the seat in 2010 – while Tory local councillor Douglas Ross again came second in the poll with 15,319 votes – up from the 10,683 he polled five years earlier.
On what was a miserable night throughout Scotland for the Labour Party, their Moray candidate Sean Morton polled 4898 votes – a fall from the 7007 collected by Kieron Green at the last general election.
The UKIP candidate Robert Scorer polled 1939 while there was a close fight for fifth place with Edinburgh-based Lib Dem candidate Jamie Paterson, who did not attend the count, polling 1395 just ahead of the Greens candidate James MacKessack-Leitch who polled 1345 votes.
Mr Robertson described his victory as part of a “seismic shift” in Scottish politics on a night when the SNP swept to 56 seats and status as the third force in UK politics with a series of stunning and record-breaking victories around the country.
The leader of the SNP at Westminster added that it was the highest ever majority recorded in Moray – adding that this was a truly “amazing result”.
A total of 49,321 votes were cast in Moray from a possible electorate of 71,685.