^aSchool of Social Science, University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, UK. E-mails: andrew.russell@manchester.ac.uk, david.cutts@manchester.ac.uk, e.fieldhouse@manchester.ac.uk

Abstract

This article is designed as a stock-taking exercise of the health of the third party in contemporary British politics, the Liberal Democrats. At the 2005 general election, the party's electoral strategy appeared to be limited by asymmetric policy platforms and for the first time in its history the party lost ground to the Conservatives but gained from Labour. However, modelling of the 2005 vote demonstrates that the key dimension to Liberal Democrat support remained electoral credibility and there is considerable evidence that tactical voting patterns established during the party's growth from 1992 to 2001 began to unravel. The Liberal Democrats remain the third party in a system designed to sustain only two, and their relative position in British politics is routinely defined only in relation to their competitors. The prognosis for a long-term realignment of this position may depend on the party's ability to exploit opportunities for changing the rules of the game.