Are U.S.A. elections rigged?

[Yukle]

Okay, this is looooooooong, but I make no apologies because I have faith in people reading.

As an outsider looking into the elections in the United States of America, it is reasonable to say that their elections are rigged, but in the ways that their general electorate is already well aware of. Each of the following problems has fundamentally enshrined unfairness into their electoral systems.

This isn’t to say that everything is terrible about their system. For one thing, many government posts are up for election every two years. That increases the level of civic involvement, and increases accountability (although this is spoiled somewhat by the problems listed below). So while this seems entirely negative, obviously the majority of the electoral system of the U.S.A., such as secret ballots, are a good thing.

This list compares the Australian and American federal parliamentary voting systems.

 

First-Past-the-Post Voting forces a de facto 2-party system

Australia, like the United States, has a House of Representatives comprising roughly equally sized electorates and a Senate that allocates the same number of senators to each state. However, the House uses preferential voting. This makes it easier for third-party candidates to be elected, while still ensuring that parties who cannot reach a majority nonetheless receive their next most preferred candidate.

The Senate uses Single-Transferable Votes and proportional representation. To oversimplify, getting 50% of the Senate takes 50% of the vote. This is extremely rare, so the Senate tends to comprise the two largest voting blocs of opposing parties and a large “Cross-Bench” of minority groups.

The U.S. cannot do this because the highest vote-winner always wins. Voting for third parties is very unlikely to enact change unless the candidate wins. Consequently, there is a de-facto 2-party system whereby most people vote for only one of the two major parties for fear that a third-party vote is a waste.

As a nice addition, in Australia a first preference vote leads to funding to a party – so parties attaining first preferences will grow in strength over time.

[Side note – Australian states receive 12 Senators each and two of its internal territories receive 2 senators each, for a total of 76.]

The net results:

·        Coalitions of minor parties are common in Australia: the current ruling Liberal Party also formally joins with the National Party, the Country Party and the Liberal Nationals.

·        20 of Australia’s 76 Senators are not part of the governing Liberal / National Coalition nor the formal Labor Opposition. Only 2 of the United States 100 Senators are independent.

·        5 of Australia’s 150 representatives are not part of the government nor the opposition. 432 out of 435 United States Representatives are from the two major parties. The other 3 seats are vacant.

·        That means 11% of Australia’s parliament is made up of minor parties, which increases to 21% if you include the minor parties who don’t caucus with the governing Liberal Party but are still in the ruling Coalition.

·        1% of the United States Congress is made up of minor parties – but only if I include the vacant seats and then round up.

 

Gerrymandering eliminates competitive seats

The excuses against gerrymandering are flimsy. They include truisms, such as the fact that socially progressive people are more likely to live in cities are therefore will create swathes of “safe” electorates regardless. That’s true… but also a flawed argument. It asserts that it’s okay to make an inherently unfair problem if it exaggerates the reality.

Gerrymandering makes it very difficult to alter the political landscape. If it wasn’t unfair, then state legislatures wouldn’t insist on keeping it. Think about it: if state legislatures in the U.S.A. are so determined to insist that gerrymandering isn’t a cause of electoral rigging then why do they persist with it? Well, because it increases their success in elections.

It is not the only cause for unrepresentative legislatures and discrepancies between voting patterns and political party strength but it is nonetheless an artificial and unfair factor that is within the capabilities of the governments to fix.

The U.S.A. has very few competitive seats. In fact, FiveThirtyEight showed that, under their modelling, the Democrats would need to win an absolute majority of roughly 8% of the vote to draw level with the Republicans in the House.

As a frame of reference, no government in Australian history has ever won the popular vote by that margin.

·        45 of 150 of Australia’s electorates are considered marginal (the incumbent is less than 5% ahead on preferences). That means 30% of the House is “competitive”.

·        26 of the United States’ congressional districts are considered marginal by the same criterion of 5% margin or less. That means only 6% of the House is “competitive.”

·        73% of the United States congressional districts are held on a margin of greater than 20% (318 of 435). Only 3% of Australia’s electorates were won by a margin of 20% or more after preferences (4 out of 150 seats).

 

Voting on a Tuesday and Voter I.D. laws disenfranchise people

99% of people in the U.S.A. who earn more than $1,000,000 per year vote in elections. Their overall turnout is about 57% (lower in mid-terms).

Higher-paid workers tend to have jobs that allow them to take an afternoon off to pop out and vote. On the other hand, lower paid workers can’t afford to take part of the day off (or all of the day, depending on how far away the poll is).

It goes beyond mere voters, though; voting on a Tuesday drastically reduces the level of volunteers available to assist on Election Day.

The solution is only partially fixed by postal and early voting because:

Some states also insist on photo I.D. when voting. 13 states also issue driver’s licenses that may not have a photo on them. The highly publicised figures of very low electoral impersonation fraud show that these laws are probably implemented to deprive poorer voters.

This is not unique to the U.S.A.; Australia requires a fixed address to vote. It is literally impossible for homeless people to vote in Australia. However, Australians vote on Saturday. Both countries have postal and absentee voting, but it's nonetheless also an issue not to have easy access on voting day due to the need for volunteers to run booths (more booths = more voting as it means less lining up).

·        Australia has a voting turnout of 94%. Voting is compulsory but the fine is a mere $20. That said, the fact it’s compulsory means it’s not a fair comparison so…

·        The United Kingdom’s turnout is about 65%.

·        The U.S.A. has a turnout of about 57% during presidential election cycles and 50% in mid-terms.

 

The Electoral College is unrepresentative

The excuses for maintaining the Electoral College sometimes include the reasoning that, “We’re a Republic, not a Democracy.” That’s a nonsensical argument, though. Republics don’t disregard the results of their votes by design. Similarly, the point of a republic is to streamline efficient diplomacy by electing people who represent the population as a whole. One chamber of Parliament is, after all, called the House of Representatives.

The Electoral College isn’t even fairly distributed – California and Texas are massively under-allocated while Wyoming is hugely over-allocated.

The theory is that it prevents smaller states being ignored but in practice it has also led to candidate after candidate appealing to the desires of a few select states while taking the majority of their constituents for granted.

Arguments in favour of the Electoral College today also ignore its intention when it was created: communication was difficult and it was hard to travel long distances. It was possible that once the Electoral College met in person they’d find that, in their opinions, there was a better candidate than whomever their constituents voted for. It was a failsafe against the popular will – it was deliberately, by design, empowering “the establishment” over the people.

·        Australia has had two occasions from 45 elections where the government has won office despite losing the popular vote. That’s a failure rate of 4%.

·        The presidential elections of 1824, 1876, 1888 and 2000 ended with the popular vote winner not winning the office. That’s 4 out of 44 elections, which is 9% failure rate.

 

The Office of President Undoes the Benefits of the rest of the System

The House represents the will of the people and the Senate represents the will of the States. One enshrines the power of the majority (in theory) while (in theory) protecting the rights of smaller states. Australia’s parliament is the same in this respect.

Then the U.S.A. has, over the top of this, somebody with near total executive power over the entire system. The President is essentially an elected monarch who wields enormous power for four years. The President has more power than the monarchy that the U.S.A. overthrew. They still appoint judges, can issue pardons, sign treaties – they lead the executive branch of government with such complete control in a manner that most monarchies have now reduced to a largely symbolic role.

In fact, Australia is a monarchy: having never left the British Monarchy, Queen Elizabeth II is Australia’s Head of State. As a result, Australia’s Prime Minister has nowhere near the power the president has, nor can s/he wield the same level of influence and there is no such thing as a veto in Australia. The Queen, meanwhile, does 0% of Australia’s governing.

 

The Constitution is too hard to change and has no means to allow compromise

Full disclosure: Australia’s constitution is a travesty. It enshrines racism (section 51 xxvi allows for laws, “for the people of any race for whom it is deemed necessary to make special laws”) and has only two protected human rights: Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Voting.

However, it does have two excellent ideas:

Firstly, amending the Constitution requires a referendum of Australia’s populace. If it passes a majority of people and a majority of states (determined as 4 out of the 6 states) then the amendment is carried. Australia has had 44 referendums since 1901, of which 8 have been carried. Once complete, the laws must be changed; there is no means for the government to prevent it, nor for states to refuse co-operation.

Conversely, amendments in the United States require the approval of two thirds of the parliament, not the people directly. Also, it requires three-quarters of state governments to ratify it, which is an extremely hard margin to reach.

Secondly, in the event that the Australian House and the Senate cannot agree to something, there is a contingency plan called a double-dissolution. If the Senate rejects the same bill twice in three months, the government can dissolve Parliament’s House and all of the Senate and call an immediate election of all House and Senate seats, thereby submitting the contentious bills to the will of the people. After the election, if the bills are rejected again then they can be put to a Joint Sitting of Parliament. Since the House is twice the size of the Senate, it’s likely that the government will win such a Sitting and be able to pass contentious bills.

Of course, if a bill is contentious and unfair or undesirable, it may result in the government of the day losing office, as happened in 1983. Alternatively, it may be returned with a comfortable majority and pass legislation, which it did in 1951, or win more narrowly and require a joint sitting, as happened in 1974.

In the U.S.A, overriding a Presidential veto requires a near-impossible two-thirds majority. It’s also important to note that, unlike Australia, this is a two-thirds majority of parliament, not the people. Furthermore, if the House and Senate cannot come to an agreement, there are no means to either force them into one or submit the idea to the public, as Australia can do.

[Altherion]

Your title is somewhat provocative -- it would be more accurate (though also more boring) to describe this thread as a comparison of Australian and American voting systems. That said, the answer to it is yes, but only in the sense that all democracies and republics come with a variety of quirks and tradeoffs. A few comments on the specific points (omitting the full quote for the sake of length):

1 hour ago, Yukle said:

First-Past-the-Post Voting forces a de facto 2-party system

Not necessarily. For example, the UK is also first-past-the-post, but it has multiple parties. The dominance of two parties in the US has not always been there and may go away with little notice -- it is a result of the alignment of elites rather an intrinsic property of the system. More generally, first-past-the-post has both advantages and disadvantages (Wiki has lists for both first-past-the-post and instant-runoff systems). There are mathematical theorems that more or less say there is no perfect way to do this.

1 hour ago, Yukle said:

The highly publicised figures of very low electoral impersonation fraud show that these laws are probably implemented to deprive poorer voters.

As with most highly publicized figures, this is propaganda. Because voting is anonymous, it is not possible to conclusively determine the extent of fraud (although it may be possible to establish a lower limit. There are studies which try to extrapolate it from other parameters, but they're far from foolproof. That said, I agree that it would be more fair to make election day a holiday.

2 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Electoral College is unrepresentative

Yes. This is by design -- as you may guess from the name, the United States places a fairly large importance on states rather than on individuals. It's a historical accident and unfair to individuals in certain states, but it's not necessarily worse than other alternatives.

2 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Office of President Undoes the Benefits of the rest of the System

You somewhat overestimate Presidential power: for some of the things you list (e.g. treaties and judges), the President needs the approval of the Senate. As you can see from the current Supreme Court stalemate, this approval is not symbolic. Furthermore, do not underestimate the power of the purse: if Congress does not fund something the President would like to do, there's simply no money to do it and no way for the President to force Congress to allocate any. That said, the President is indeed more powerful than executives in other countries. As usual, this has both advantages and disadvantages.

2 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Constitution is too hard to change and has no means to allow compromise

Yes, it is quite difficult to change the text... but it is not nearly as difficult to change the meaning: all it takes is a proper court case and a Supreme Court majority. Over the centuries, the US Constitution has evolved far, far more than a reading of amendments would suggest. I guarantee you that certain clauses are currently being interpreted in a way that the people who wrote them never, ever intended.

2 hours ago, Yukle said:

In the U.S.A, overriding a Presidential veto requires a near-impossible two-thirds majority. It’s also important to note that, unlike Australia, this is a two-thirds majority of parliament, not the people. Furthermore, if the House and Senate cannot come to an agreement, there are no means to either force them into one or submit the idea to the public, as Australia can do.

All of this is completely intentional. The idea is to prevent government from acting unless there is broad agreement that it should act. This philosophical preference runs through practically every aspect of US government (i.e. it's not a bug, it's a feature).

[The Marquis de Leech]

The US governmental system is "rigged" to stop stuff happening - the engine of a lawnmower and the brakes of a Rolls Royce, if you will. It was also set up in the eighteenth century.

I'd also point out Australia made copious borrowings from the US in its own Constitution. And that gerrymandering is not a purely American phenomenon.

[Inigima]

4 hours ago, Altherion said:

As with most highly publicized figures, this is propaganda. Because voting is anonymous, it is not possible to conclusively determine the extent of fraud (although it may be possible to establish a lower limit. There are studies which try to extrapolate it from other parameters, but they're far from foolproof. That said, I agree that it would be more fair to make election day a holiday.

This is not true. For whom you voted is anonymous; that you voted is public record and is available.

[The Anti-Targ]

 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Yes the US has serious systemic problems with government.  Time, long past time, for a Constitutional Convention to address these problems in total rather than piecemeal and ad hoc.

[Inigima]

I know it's your pet thing, but I am way too scared of what the other side might successfully enshrine in the Constitution to want a constitutional convention. 

[all swedes are racist]

7 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Yes the US has serious systemic problems with government.  Time, long past time, for a Constitutional Convention to address these problems in total rather than piecemeal and ad hoc.

Ad fucking hoc

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

23 minutes ago, Inigima said:

I know it's your pet thing, but I am way too scared of what the other side might successfully enshrine in the Constitution to want a constitutional convention. 

Inigima,

So we just continue with the dangerously broken system we have, until it collapses of its own weight?  How's that going to go when it actually happens if it isn't in progress already?

[The hairy bear]

10 hours ago, Yukle said:

First-Past-the-Post Voting forces a de facto 2-party system

I agree that the first past the post voting is unfair, specially where the electoral circumscriptions are big (as in the U.S.). And the main problem, as you say, is that on the long run imposes a two party system where the voters find themselves having to choose between the lesser of the two evils.

10 hours ago, Yukle said:

Gerrymandering eliminates competitive seats

This is a more complicated issue. In many situations, the lack of a competitive seat is not due to gerrymandering, but the result of a given community having common interests and preferences. As I see it, though, the problems with gerrymeandering can easily be solved by getting rid of the first-past-the-vote system.

10 hours ago, Yukle said:

Voting on a Tuesday and Voter I.D. laws disenfranchise people

I'm inclined to agree that voting on Tuesday is an old relic that could be avoided. However, I think that having small, easily avoidable difficulties for voting is not necessarily bad. The people who is willing to register beforehand and spending half an hour of their time in a cue is likely to be interested in politics, be well informed about the candidates, and really care about the outcome. If someone just doesn't care much about the elections, I tend to believe that his vote is not much missed.

[Obviously, when we are talking about huge inconveniences that allow to vote only people with a lot of free time and resources, it's a very bad thing]

10 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Electoral College is unrepresentative

I disagree. Again, once you get rid of the first-past-the-vote system, the electoral college is perfectly representative of each state. And you'd also avoid candidates to concentrate on a "select few states", while allowing the smaller states to have a say.

10 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Office of President Undoes the Benefits of the rest of the System

I'm not sure about that. As Altherion says, there are a lot of counterweights to the presidential power. And I'd say that in many countries their executive has more power than in the US.

10 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Constitution is too hard to change and has no means to allow compromise

I agree with this. Every country should change its constitution every 50 years or so. It's undemocratic that many generations are not allowed to vote whether they agree or not with the most important law.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Inigimia,

And in fairness I'm pretty scared of what could be added or removed from a new Constitution, it still needs to happen.

[Castel]

53 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Inigima,

So we just continue with the dangerously broken system we have, until it collapses of its own weight?  How's that going to go when it actually happens if it isn't in progress already?

Honestly, if you can rustle up, what was it again? 3/4ths agreement from states you deserve to pass an amendment

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

2/3 to call a convention for making amendments 3/4 to ratify any amendments offered.

[SerPaladin]

Objectively rigged is tough to pull off.

But things can, and have been manipulated.

Got a county or state with a republican leadership and some big cities? Send the same number of voting booths to the Inner City voting location with 30,000 voters as you send to the suburban district with 2,000. Those long lines can and will discourage voters.

Be a heavy ad buyer on the local information brokers. Seniors and those in the cities rely more on newspapers and radio. Historically the radio guys were "softer" on their advertisers, and more recently, newspapers have absolutely followed suit. If your interest group (whether it's Camber of Commerce or Union) can buy year round, you will get the kid gloves.

I don't know if the "slant" of newspapers and other media qualifies as "rigged".

The internet era is producing improved access to information, but even that is proving to be of little worth. Seems like nearly half the country is under the perception that things are great, half think it's terrible (and please don't use this as a conversational pivot try and convince me things are great or terrible, that's not the point).

[sologdin]

ZOMG the US elections are not rigged.  that's what the US does to other states, such as when diem returns 98% of the vote in vietnam, or when the 1948 european elections were subverted by the CIA.

[DMC]

So I've never ventured around these parts of the forum, but with only hours to go and internet tension at critical mass curiosity got the best of me.  This is an interesting post.  I am a phd candidate in political science and adjunct professor at a major ("R1") American university, currently teaching an upper-level course on media and politics (funfun!)  Over the past five years, I have taught numerous iterations of "Intro to American Gov't" courses at 3 different institutions using at least 5 different textbooks (which are virtually identical in content).  The reason I mention this - other than to show off obviously - is to assure you that each of these issues are addressed during the curricula of such courses/textbooks (obviously, I do not know how much other instructors attend to them).  Is it a problem that many, if not most, young Americans are not cognizant of such issues upon completing high school?  Don't get me started.  But, also don't ask me to teach high school kids.

14 hours ago, Yukle said:

First-Past-the-Post Voting forces a de facto 2-party system

Yes, this is known as Duverger's Law.  It is pretty durable - and most of the notable exceptions (UK, Canada, India) still functionally have a two-party system.  While if you held a gun to their head, most parties scholars would tell you they prefer PR systems to winner-take-all, there are pros and cons to both.  The primary reason for the U.S.' electoral system is its federal structure.  Single-member districts were incredibly important to the Framers in order to compose the House of Representatives.  While the Framers had a palpable fear of the tyranny of the majority (which we'll get to later), Madison and most others also strongly believed one branch of the national government should be as close to the people as possible; and this branch should naturally hold the "power of the purse."  This is why the House is known as "the people's chamber," and why members are up for election every two years.

14 hours ago, Yukle said:

Gerrymandering eliminates competitive seats

Gerrymandering is an issue, and certainly the reason the GOP kept the House in 2012 despite Democratic candidates gaining 1.4 million more votes, but its impact and scope is often overwrought by scholars and especially pundits.  While slightly higher in the House, the incumbency advantage is enormous in both the House and Senate.  Obviously, there is no gerrymandering in the Senate, so there are other factors that contribute to the dearth of competitive contests.  As mentioned by @The hairy bear, this is in part due to the fact many communities have increasingly aligned preferences.  This is called geographic sorting, has been empirically demonstrated, and helps drive polarization in the electorate.  The fundraising advantage of incumbents - and increasing gap between incumbents and challengers - is also commonly identified as a key factor.  

It should be noted SCOTUS has struck down race-based gerrymandering (see Shaw v. Reno 1993), but not partisan-based gerrymandering (see Easley v. Cromartie 2001).  One potential solution to this is non-partisan redistricting commissions that are completely separate from state legislatures.  These have been adopted in a number of states, most famously Arizona.  The evidence on whether this completely nullifies gerrymandering efforts is TBD - and the cynic in me has doubts whenever something purports to be "non-partisan" - but such notions are becoming increasingly popular throughout the country.

14 hours ago, Yukle said:

Voting on a Tuesday and Voter I.D. laws disenfranchise people

The literature on this is legion - the U.S. institutes higher "costs" of voting than any other industrialized democracy.  It is difficult for me not to outright say "Voter ID laws are racist" to students, because that isn't technically true.  But, Voter ID laws are racist.  Moreover, we are one of the only countries wherein every citizen is not automatically registered to vote.  These restrictions - coupled, of course, with mass incarceration (and subsequent restrictions on voting for ex-cons) - is the new Jim Crow.  

14 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Electoral College is unrepresentative

I have never encountered, either personally or in research, a single credible scholar that is willing to defend the electoral college.  It is an artifact of the Framers' elitism and fear of the masses; as well as, not for nothing, their fear of a tyrant and demigod in the White House.  The reason it has not been abolished is the same reason D.C. still does not have voting members in the House and Puerto Rico is not a state - one party clearly would benefit from the change.  Most small states are rural and, due to the Senate, garner a disproportionate share of the electoral college in relation to their population.  

Since at least Bush v. Gore, there has been a "National Popular Vote Plan" to effectively abolish the electoral college without having to go through the amendment process.  Only 105 electoral votes to go!

14 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Office of President Undoes the Benefits of the rest of the System

This is a loaded and complicated statement; I will try to keep my response brief.  The formal checks on executive power have not changed since the founding.  And, until the rise of the "modern presidency" (normally described as beginning with FDR's administration), the institutional balance of power favored the legislature over the presidency, as Madison intended.  The reasons the president has come to dominate the legislature is first and foremost the rise of the federal bureaucracy.  As political power has centralized into this national behemoth, the chief executive has naturally gained more and more influence (common agency problems aside).  Also, technological changes have increased the influence of the "bully pulpit" as the public president has increased influence (and inherent advantages) on the average constituent vis-a-vis their congressperson.

Further, Congress continually defers to the presidency, abdicating their responsibility in the checks and balances system.  The most prescient example is the War Powers Act of 1973.  This was meant to curb unilateral aggressions by the president after the Nixon administration's conduct in Vietnam and Cambodia.  Ostensibly a reassertion of Congress' War Powers, presidents rarely abided by its conditions for the next 40 years and Congress invoked it even less.  Thus, when Congress finally did point out Obama violated the provisions in Libya in 2011, their credibility was already sapped.  From budgetary powers, to domestic policies, to the creation of bureaucratic agencies, this pattern is mimicked.

On final note on unilateral action, which is what I'm currently researching.  There has been a rise in "significant" or "policy oriented" unilateral activities by the president over the past 30 years.  However, one empirical regularity that would surprise most non-academics is unilateral action actually increases during unified government.  This indicates both (1) once again, Congress is happy to defer powers to the president when they share preferences, and (2) there still remains a strategic calculus on behalf of presidents that increased unilateral action will be "checked" by an opposition congress.

15 hours ago, Yukle said:

The Constitution is too hard to change and has no means to allow compromise

Well, there were plenty of periods throughout American history with high levels of legislative productivity - and the amendments process has not changed.  The difficulty of changing the Constitution is once again by design of the Framers.  Sure, Thomas Jefferson spoke of each generation abolishing and creating their own, but he was in the decided minority (and pissed as all hell he wasn't at the convention in the first place).  Gridlock and interbranch intransigence has nothing to do with the Constitution and everything to do with polarization.  Institutionally, these has given way to an exponential rise in not only filibusters, but the threats of filibusters.  Ideologically, members of Congress continue to grow further and further apart.  

There are myriad proposed explanations on the causes and potential elixirs to polarization, but this post is already very long.  I will just say that relaxing amendment requirements would not lead to more compromise in the United States; rather it would drastically increase the stability of the federal government to a dangerous state.

[felice]

13 hours ago, Altherion said:

Not necessarily. For example, the UK is also first-past-the-post, but it has multiple parties.

Yes, and the Lib-Dems and their ancestors are responsible for basically every Tory victory ever, due to splitting the left-ish vote with Labour. Their popularity plummeted when they went into coalition with the Tories in 2010. Voting for any party other than one of the big two under FPP is not just pointless, it actively works against your interests. Third parties can only get any seats to the extent that their support is disproportionately local to specific electorates.

[Hereward]

Dubious on a number of fronts. LibDems are not Labour supporters, if they were, they'd vote Labour. They often dislike Labour even more than they dislike Tories. Yes, in 2015 the LibDems lost votes, but many of that vote went to the Tories, not Labour, as shown by the Tories taking most of the LibDem seats and Labour doing no better than in 2010.

[felice]

45 minutes ago, Hereward said:

Yes, in 2015 the LibDems lost votes, but many of that vote went to the Tories, not Labour, as shown by the Tories taking most of the LibDem seats and Labour doing no better than in 2010.

The Conservatives' share of the total vote only went up 0.4% in 2015, while Labour's share increased by 1.5%. Unfortunately a lot of the votes went to UKIP, though the SNP and Greens also went up. Former Lib-Dem seats going to the Tories can be explained by vote splitting.

[Hereward]

The Tories lost votes to UKIP and gained them from the LibDems. Vote splitting doesn't really explain the loss of most LiBDem seats in the south and west, as there wasn't a Labour vote to split.

But this discussion now belongs elsewhere.