Scottish National Party leader Nicola Sturgeon said she would push ahead with plans for a new independence referendum after results showed her party would win an election to Scotland's parliament, albeit without a majority.

The results of the election mean the SNP together with the Scottish Greens will hold a significant pro-independence majority in the parliament.

"In normal democratic debate, parties that promise something in an election and get elected are made to deliver on those commitments," Ms Sturgeon told the BBC. "It is an absurdity that in Scotland we seem to have other parties determined to block the party or parties that have won the mandate."

The election was dominated by a single theme: whether the nation of 5.5 million should get another vote on leaving the U.K. in the wake of Brexit. The outcome sets up an escalating standoff with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson over Scotland's constitutional future.

Ms Sturgeon will use her mandate to pressure the British government to acquiesce to another referendum. In an interview with the Telegraph newspaper, Mr Johnson suggested he would reject calls even if the SNP secured a majority in the Scottish Parliament. A referendum right now would be "irresponsible and reckless," he said.

But if Johnson wants to stop Scottish legislation on a referendum, he will have to go to the Supreme Court to challenge it, Ms Sturgeon told ITV News. "The absurdity of a position where a PM was going to court to overturn the democratic decision of the Scottish people?" Sturgeon said. "I don't think we'll get to that position."

Ms Sturgeon has been pressing for another referendum since Scotland voted against Brexit in 2016. Her government in Edinburgh has control over policy areas such as health, education, justice and transportation and some financial affairs, though not key issues post-Brexit such as immigration and foreign policy.

Scotland was among a swathe of voting across the U.K. that included English local councils and the Welsh assembly. Johnson's Conservatives scored an increase in support in England, including winning an electoral district in the northeast held by Labour since it was created in 1974.

The Scottish election hardened the dividing lines on the U.K. political map and also over where Scotland goes next.

The last plebiscite on independence, in 2014, came after the SNP won a majority three years earlier and the U.K. government granted the legal power to hold one. The result was 55% to 45% in favor of Scotland remaining in the three-centuries-old union with England and Wales. The latest polls show support for both sides is now roughly neck and neck.

The SNP has won the nine constituencies in the Glasgow electoral region.
The SNP winners included Kaukab Stewart, Scotland's first female ethnic minorty MSP, who won in the Glasgow Kelvin constituency.
Other winners included Ivan McKee, Scotland's Trade Minister, James Dornan and John Mason.

Bloomberg