Liberal Party of Australia

The Liberal Party of Australia is a major centre-right political party in Australia, one of the two major parties in Australian politics, along with the centre-left Australian Labor Party.
It was founded in 1944 as the successor to the United Australia Party.
Spread

The party's ideology has been referred to as conservative, liberal-conservative, conservative-liberal, and classical liberal.
The Liberal Party tends to promote economic liberalism (which in the Australian usage refers to free markets and small government).
Two past leaders of the party, Sir Robert Menzies and John Howard, are Australia's two longest-serving Prime Ministers.
Sir Robert Gordon Menzies
20 December 1894 – 15 May 1978)
an Australian politician who twice served as Prime Minister of Australia, in office from 1939 to 1941 and again from 1949 to 1966. He played a central role in the creation of the Liberal Party of Australia, defining its policies and its broad outreach. He is Australia's longest-serving prime minister, serving over 18 years in total.
John Winston Howard
born 26 July 1939
an Australian former politician who served as the 25th Prime Minister of Australia from 1996 to 2007. He is the second-longest serving Australian Prime Minister, behind only Sir Robert Menzies, who was in office for over 18 years. He is also the oldest living former Australian Prime Minister, having been so since the death of Bob Hawke on 16 May 2019. Howard was leader of the Liberal Party from 1985 to 1989 and from 1995 to 2007.
Leaders

Foundation
In 1944, the Liberal Party of Australia was founded after a three-day meeting held in a small hall not far from Parliament House in Canberra. The meeting was called by the then Leader of the Opposition (United Australia Party) Robert Menzies.
Robert Menzies had already served as Prime Minister of Australia (1939-41), but he believed that the non-Labor parties should unite to present a strong alternative government to the Australian people.
Eighty men and women from 18 non-Labor political parties and organisations attended the first Canberra conference.
They shared a common belief that Australians should have greater personal freedom and choice than that offered under Labor’s post-war socialist plans.
On October 16, 1944, the name The Liberal Party of Australia was adopted, uniting the many different political organisations. Two months later, at the Albury Conference, the Party’s organisational and constitutional framework was drawn up.
The name Liberal was chosen deliberately for its associations with progressive nineteenth century free enterprise and social equality. By May 1945 membership of the Liberal Party had swelled to 40,000.

Strong opposition to socialism and communism in Australia and abroad was one of its founding principles. The party's founder and longest-serving leader Robert Menzies envisaged that Australia's middle class would form its main constituency
Ideology
The contemporary Liberal Party generally advocates economic liberalism.
Historically, the party has supported a higher degree of economic protectionism and interventionism than it has in recent decades. However, from its foundation the party has identified itself as an anti-socialist grouping of liberals and conservatives.