The last remaining Democrat State parliamentarian, David Winderlich, left the party and was defeated as an independent in 2010. This was largely attributed to party leader Meg Lees' decision to pass the Howard government's goods and services tax, which led to several years of popular recriminations and party infighting that destroyed the Democrats' reputation as competent overseers of legislation. However, at the 20 federal elections, all seven of its Senate seats were lost as the party's share of the vote collapsed. Over three decades, the Australian Democrats achieved representation in the legislatures of the ACT, South Australia, New South Wales, Western Australia and Tasmania as well as Commonwealth Senate seats in all six states.

Ideologically, the Democrats were usually regarded as centrists, occupying the political middle ground between the Liberal Party and the Labor Party. Due to the party's numbers in the Senate, both Liberal and Labor governments required the assistance of the Democrats to pass contentious legislation. The party would retain a presence in the Senate for the next 30 years, at its peak (between 19) holding nine out of 76 seats, though never securing a seat in the lower house. At the 1977 federal election, the Democrats polled 11.1 percent of the Senate vote and secured two seats. The Democrats' inaugural leader was Don Chipp, a former Liberal cabinet minister, who famously promised to 'keep the bastards honest'. Founded in 1977 from a merger of the Australia Party and the New Liberal Movement, both of which were descended from Liberal Party dissenting splinter groups, it was Australia's largest minor party from its formation in 1977 through to 2004 and frequently held the balance of power in the Senate during that time.

The Australian Democrats is a centrist political party in Australia.

Liberal and Democratic Union (1906–1910).

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