Labour did not take over a parliament that had been “dominated by Conservatives and Liberals” in 1997 … because the Liberal Party went out of existence in 1988, merging with the Social Democrats to form the Liberal Democratic Party, And if Imperato is referring to the LDs as the “Liberals” ... well, the LDs more than doubled their number of seats in 1997 (from 20 to 46, of 659), the year that Imperato claims they were eclipsed by Blair’s “third party,” although 1997 was also the bottom of a downward trend for them in the total popular vote (from 25.4% in 1983 for the Liberals to to 16.8% in 1997 for the Liberal Democrats). They’ve since come back up, polling 18.3% and 22% in the 2001 and 2005 elections respectively.