A major and urgent investigation was launched today into the electronic voting failures which disrupted the Scottish Parliament elections.

10 Downing Street said the problems with the new electronic system raised serious question marks about the future development of the technology not just North of the Border but across the UK.

The inquiry was announced by the Scotland Office who said "serious technical failures" had delayed the announcement of results in several areas.

More than 100,000 votes across the country may have to be discounted and problems with the new electronic counting system, being used for the first time in Scotland, also meant several counts were suspended until much later in the day.

A spokesman said: "In the first instance, these failures must be investigated by DRS (the company behind the vote-counting technology) and relevant returning offices against the timing targets set in the supply contract. We share the public's concern about the high number of rejected ballot papers."

The problems, which delayed several key counts and left Government plans to extend the system to other polls across Britain in chaos, meant that the result of yesterday's Holyrood contest in which the Scottish National Party (SNP) hopes to become the largest party and control of the Edinburgh Executive on knife edge well into the afternoon.

The independent Electoral Commission will carry out a statutory review into the election.

The Scotland Office spokesman said: "It is important that they look as a matter of urgency into delays in postal ballots, the high number of spoiled ballot papers, and the performance of the electronic counting machines."