A hundred-odd  years of “one-and-half party rule” (Richard Gwyn’s line) has produced parties with equal and opposed psychological defects: Liberal arrogance and self-satisfaction vs Tory insecurity and peevishness. 
The one thing they have in common is a tendency to abuse power and cut ethical and democratic corners when they are in government — the Liberals, because they can; the Tories, because (they tell themselves) they must, to level the playing field.