David Cameron has held out a "big, open and comprehensive offer" to the Liberal Democrats to work together in government.
In a statement in Westminster, he acknowledged that there would have to be reform of the electoral system and he proposed the creation of an all-party committee of inquiry to look at the issue.
It was not immediately clear whether Mr Cameron's offer would involve a formal coalition with Lib Dem ministers in a Cabinet.
As a major carrot to attract Lib Dem support, Mr Cameron offered an all-party committee of inquiry on political and electoral reform to look at the possibility of changing Westminster's first-past-the-post voting system.
But he stopped short of promising the immediate legislation on a referendum on voting reform offered by Prime Minister Gordon Brown less than an hour earlier.
Mr Cameron stressed that it was essential that the parties were able to offer leadership to the country: "Britain voted for change yesterday, but it also voted for a new politics, it did not vote for party political bickering, grandstanding and point-scoring.
"Our country's problems are too serious, they are too urgent for that. So we must all rise to this occasion, we must show leadership."
Mr Cameron outlined the areas of policy agreement between the Conservatives and Lib Dems, which he said offered "a strong basis for a strong government".
At the same time he stressed that - unlike the Lib Dems - the Tories remained "completely convinced" the the new government would have to start cutting Britain's record £163 billion deficit this year.
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"This has been more than confirmed by recent events in other European countries, recent instability in the markets and recent conversations that we have had both with the Treasury and the Bank of England," he said.
