The Liberal Democrats are a social liberal political party in the United Kingdom which supports constitutional and electoral reform,progressive taxation,wealth taxation,environmentalism, human rights laws,cultural liberalism,banking reform and civil liberties.

The party was formed in 1988 by a merger of the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party. The two parties had formed the electoral SDP–Liberal Alliance for seven years before then, since the SDP's formation. The Liberals had been in existence for 129 years and in power under leaders such as Gladstone, Asquith and Lloyd George.

Nick Clegg was elected Leader in 2007. At the 2010 general election, Liberal Democrats won 23% of the vote and 57 of the 650 seats, making them the third-largest party in the House of Commons, behind the Conservatives with 307 and Labour with 258. No party having an overall majority; the Liberal Democrats became the junior partners in a coalition government with the Conservatives, with Clegg becoming Deputy Prime Minister and other Liberal Democrats taking up ministerial positions.

Nigel Paul Farage ( /ˈfærɑːʒ/, FARR-ahzh; born 3 April 1964, Farnborough, Kent), is a British politician and is the Leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), a position he also held from September 2006 to November 2009. He is a Member of the European Parliament for South East England and co-chairs the Eurosceptic Europe of Freedom and Democracy group.

Farage is a founding member of the UKIP, having left the Conservative Party in 1992 after they signed the Maastricht Treaty. Having unsuccessfully campaigned in European and Westminster parliamentary elections for UKIP since 1994, he gained a seat as an MEP for South East England in the 1999 European Parliament Election — the first year the regional list system was used — and was re-elected in 2004 and 2009. Farage describes himself as a libertarian and rejects the notion that he is a conservative.

In September 2006, Farage became the UKIP Leader and led the party through the 2009 European Parliament Election in which it received the second highest share of the popular vote, defeating Labour and the Liberal Democrats with over two million votes. However he stepped down in November 2009 to concentrate on contesting the Speaker John Bercow's seat of Buckingham in the 2010 general election.

Sir Graham Robert Watson (born 23 March 1956) is a European politician from the United Kingdom. He has served as a Member of the European Parliament for South West England since 1994 and was the leader of the Group of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party 2002–2004 and the first leader of the Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe 2004–2009. Since 2011, he is the President of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party.

Graham Watson was born in Rothesay on the Isle of Bute (Scotland, United Kingdom). His father was an officer in the Royal Navy and his mother a teacher. Watson was educated at the City of Bath Boys' School, where he played violin in the school orchestra. He later returned to Scotland to attend Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh where he graduated in 1979 with a Bachelor of Arts in modern languages. This allowed him to work as an interpreter between 1979 and 1980, he now speaks four European languages. After 1980 he worked as an administrator at Paisley College until 1983.

Nicholas William Peter "Nick" Clegg (born 7 January 1967) is the British Liberal Democrat Leader since 2007 and currently the Deputy Prime Minister and Lord President of the Council (with special responsibility for political and constitutional reform) in the coalition government of which David Cameron is the Prime Minister. Clegg has been the Leader of the Liberal Democrats since 2007, and a Member of Parliament (MP) representing Sheffield Hallam since 2005. He was previously a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) and an award winning journalist for the Financial Times.

Clegg was elected to the House of Commons at the 2005 general election and became the Liberal Democrats' Home Affairs spokesperson in 2006. Clegg became Deputy Prime Minister following the 2010 general election, when the Liberal Democrats formed a coalition government with the Conservative Party. As well as his parliamentary roles, Clegg has contributed to many pamphlets and books on political issues. He has also had a large number of jobs, including being a skiing instructor and working in the office of a bank in Helsinki.

Timothy James Farron (born 27 May 1970) is a British Liberal Democrat politician. He is currently Member of Parliament (MP) for the constituency of Westmorland and Lonsdale. He was elected President of the Liberal Democrats in November 2010 and assumed the office on 1 January 2011.

Farron was born in Preston, Lancashire, and was educated at Lostock Hall High School and Runshaw College, Leyland, before going on to Newcastle University where he gained a BA in Politics in 1992. He was president of Newcastle University Union Society - the first Lib Dem to hold the position - in 1991, having joined the Liberal Party at the age of 16. In 1990, he was elected to the National Union of Students' National Executive. Prior to his election to Parliament, Farron worked in higher education at Lancaster University from 1992–2002 and St. Martin's College, Ambleside, from 2002-5.

Farron contested the North West Durham constituency at the 1992 general election, where he finished in third place, 20,006 votes behind the sitting Labour Party MP Hilary Armstrong.