They received a larger amount of votes in England because ofa number of things, many of them nothing to do with the Tories, but geography. For instance in many seats - ~100 - Labour voters 'lend' their vote to the Lib dems in a bid to unseat the Tory, as Labour has no chance in that constituency. This drastically reduces Labours vote, clearly. Plus you have the fact that Tory supporters are far more likely to vote than Labour ones.. Especially as people expected Labour to win.. Funnily enough the Tories got more votes in England not because they were more popular than Labour, but because they were and still are so hated!