ABSTRACT
In theory Britain has a bipartisan political system. There have, however, been times when one party has exerted a long-term domination for several successive governments. The Conservatives had, for example, been on top between 1885 and 1905, when they had won four out of the five general elections. The pattern was broken at the beginning of the twentieth century when, in 1906, the Conservatives won only 133 seats to the Liberals’ 400. But this proved to be the Liberal party’s Indian summer and the Conservatives were already on the road to recovery before 1914. In the general elections of January and December 1910 they won 241 and 237 seats respectively, just over 30 short of a greatly reduced Liberal tally.
