[2][4] In 1986, she was appointed a Democrat senator for Victoria, upon the resignation of the party's founder, Don Chipp.

The party's founding leader, Don Chipp, described the coup as the "most tragic story to have hit the Democrats".

[2][8] After internal disagreements related to her loss of the leadership, she resigned from the party in 1992 and continued as an independent senator until her defeat at the 1993 election.

After quitting the Democrats, she reminded the Senate of her non-partisan approach in pursuit of reforms, including a successful private senator's bill:"In the six years that I have been in this place I have valued most highly the cooperative work that I have been able to do with colleagues on all sides of the chamber...for example, I reflect on the magnificent work done by former Senator Peter Baume which played a large part in enabling the passage, unopposed, through the Parliament of my private member's Bill which banned the print advertising of tobacco products.

In the 2006 Victorian state election she unsuccessfully stood for the Greens in the Eastern Metropolitan Region.