COUNTING is underway in the European elections tonight with Labour braced for another battering at the polls.

The first results are due to come in nearly this evening with counts for the South East region - which includes Kent - taking place at Southampton.

It is widely expected that Labour, bruised from a disastrous set of council election results on Friday, will suffer at the hands of voters for a second time. If the results are as poor as polls have predicted, Gordon Brown is likely to face further pressure from within his party to stand down.

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Local counts are taking place across all Kent's districts. Results from these areas will be added in to the totals for the whole of the south east region, with MEPs returned under a system of proportional representation.

There are ten seats up for grabs in the south east and there are predictions that some of the smaller parties are likely to do well at the expense of all three main parties.

The region, which has an electorate of just over six million, willl return ten MEPs. There are currently four Conservative MEPs; two UKIP; two Liberal Democrats; one Labour and one Green.

Labour came second in 2004 but polls ahead of the vote suggested that it could be pushed into third or even fourth place if parties like UKIP perform well.

UKIP leader Nigel Farage said tonight he was hopeful of improving on 2004 but suggested that confusion at polling stations over the ballot papers could have harmed the party's prospects. There were complaints that the size of the ballot paper, which had to be folded, meant many voters wrongly believed UKIP was not among the parties contesting various seats.

"We are hopeful that we will do better and pick up about 20 per cent of the vote. Reports in the south east suggest the ballot situation is far worse and there were tens of thousands of voters who wanted to vote UKIP but did not," said Mr Farage.

The Conservatives, who polled just over 35 per cent of the votes cast in 2004, are optimistic that they can increase the four MEPs they presently have.

The Greens took eight per cent of the vote last time and the region's representative Dr Caroline Lucas believes disenchantment among voters for the main parties could improve their chances of securing a second seat.

Held on Thursday, 375 million people across 27 countries were able to vote for the 736 members of the European Parliament who will represent their interests for the next five years.

KENT ONLINE WILL BE CARRYING THE RESULTS FOR THE SOUTH EAST REGION AND PROVIDING UPDATES THROUGHOUT SUNDAY NIGHT