Tim Loughton conceded the snap election called by his Prime Minister was a mistake as he scraped home against Labour's first transgender candidate.

The Conservative MP was made to sweat as he paced the Assembly Hall in Worthing staring anxiously at the mounds of votes in his opponent's baskets which bulged with ballots.

In 2015, he won easily with 24,686 votes and the runner up was Labour's Tim Macpherson with just 9,737.

When those votes were being counted, this year's Labour candidate Sophie Cook couldn't land a job stacking shelves as she battled coming out as transgender.

This morning, she amassed a spectacular 20,882 to her Tory opponent's 25,988.

The two-horse race was borne from the squeezing of the minority parties, and played right into Labour's hands, according to Loughton.

'Judging on tonight then it's clearly a mistake,' he said.

'I can see why she did it, but it's backfired and we've lost some very good people who have been cut off in their prime.'

He said negotiating a Brexit deal without the mandate the party will have wished will be the incoming leader's biggest challenge, assuming Theresa May relinquishes her post having failed to strengthen her position.

Loughton said the railways, schools and the A27 were the first things he'd be addressing upon his return to Westminster.

Stunningly, he was up against a complete political rookie in Sophie Cook who almost secured a place in history.

She said: 'I only came out 23 months ago and back then I was applying for jobs stacking shelves in Asda and not getting them.

'I'm ex-Air Force and ex-newspaper sales, I'm a photographer at a Premier League club but I didn't think I'd get anything.

'We've gone out and fought a campaign based on honesty and integrity and policies and five weeks ago no-one gave Labour a hope in this constituency, 'I was told this was a safe Tory seat.

'If nothing else we've proved it's not a safe Tory seat and we've proved if people believe, if people work hard and if people have the faith then we can achieve anything.'

And will she stay in politics? 'I've lost my career in TV, I may not have a job, but I think I've found a new career,' said a defiant Sophie Cook.

Earlier she had said her opponent was the type of man who would set his own house on fire to be pictured throwing a bucket of water on it, but the trash talk dissipated when the results rolled in.

The Liberal Democrats picked up the gong for the best of the rest with Oli Henman gaining 2,523 votes as Ukip's Mike Glennon won 1,444 and the Greens' Leslie Groves Williams claimed 1,273.

Mopping up the remaining votes were Andy Lutwyche of the Independent party with 452 and National Health Action's Carl Walker with 575.