Campbell Clegg (2007–present) On 18 December 2007, Nick Clegg won the leadership election, becoming the party's fourth leader. Clegg won the leadership with a majority

In his acceptance speech, Clegg declared that he was "a liberal by temperament, by instinct and by upbringing" and that he believes "Britain [is] a place of tolerance and pluralism". He claimed that his priorities were defending civil liberties; devolving the running of public services to parents, pupils and patients; and protecting the environment,^[39] and that he wanted to forge a "liberal alternative to the discredited policies of big government".^[38] He also proposed a target to double the number of Lib Dem MPs within two elections, and before the 2008 local elections confirmed that he was pleased with their performance in the polls: "the polls yesterday were at 20%, that's considerably higher than 13% just a few years ago. It's far, far higher than we've ever been at this point in the political cycle two or three years after a general election."^[40]

Shortly after election, Clegg reshuffled the party's frontbench team, making Chris Huhne the replacement Home Affairs spokesperson, Ed Davey the Foreign Affairs spokesperson, and keeping Vince Cable as Shadow Chancellor.^[41] His predecessors were also given roles: Campbell joined the all-party Commons foreign affairs select committee, and Kennedy campaigned nationwide on European issues, as president of the UK's European Movement.^[41]

Coalition government (2010)

In the general election held on 6 May 2010, the Liberal Democrats' representation went down by 5 seats in the House of Commons, giving them 57 seats, despite increasing their share of the vote to 23%. Nevertheless, the election returned a hung parliament with no party having an absolute majority. Negotiations between the Lib Dems and two main parties occurred in the following days. Upon David Cameron becoming Prime Minister on 11 May after Gordon Brown's resignation, the Liberal Democrats formed a coalition government with the Conservative Party with Nick Clegg as Deputy Prime Minister and other Liberal Democrats in the cabinet.^[44]

In United Kingdom general elections, the Lib Dems succeeded the Liberal-SDP Alliance as the third most popular party, behind Labour and the Conservatives. Their popularity initially declined from the levels attained by the Alliance, but their seat count has risen to its peak of 63 seats, a feat that has been credited to more intelligent targeting of vulnerable seats.^[18] The vote percentage for the Alliance in 1987 and the Lib Dems in 2005 is similar, yet the Lib Dems won 62 seats to the Alliance's 22.^[25]

The first-past-the-post electoral system used in UK General Elections is not suited to parties whose vote is evenly divided across the country, resulting in those parties achieving a lower proportion of seats in the Commons than their proportion of the popular vote (see table and graph). The Lib Dems and their Liberal and SDP predecessors have suffered especially,^[45] particularly in the 1980s when their electoral support was greatest while the disparity between the votes and the number of MPs returned to parliament was significantly large. The increase in their number of seats in 1997, 2001 and 2005 was attributed to the weakness of the Conservatives and the success of their election strategist Lord Rennard.^[18] Lib Dems state that they want 'three-party politics' in the Commons;^[46][47] the most realistic chance of power with first past the post is for the party to be the kingmakers in a hung parliament.^[48] Party leaders often set out their terms for forming a coalition in such an event—Nick Clegg stated in 2008 that the policy for the 2010 General Election is to reform elections, parties and parliament in a "constitutional convention".^[49]