Its stated aims and objectives in 2011 were:[3] In December 2006 the JDA presented an extensive and detailed proposal for electoral reform, to tackle Jersey's lack of political engagement among the general public.
The party was launched in April 2005 at a mass rally of 1,000 people held at Fort Regent, with the intention of fielding candidates in the 2005 elections of senators and deputies to the States of Jersey.
[9] The JDA's founder was Senator Ted Vibert, a returned expatriate and veteran activist in the Australian Labor Party who had been elected to the States of Jersey in February 2003.
[11] Some members, including Senator Paul Le Claire feared that under Southern the JDA would move too far to the left, and formed the Centre Party.
[12] At the JDA's inaugural annual general meeting in July 2005, Southern said that "the party would continue to maintain the centre ground of politics despite claims from a breakaway group that the alliance had moved to the left under his leadership".
[20] In mitigation their advocate submitted that the law infringed the human rights of the disabled and infirm to take part in the electoral process and the debate on Article 39A in the States had been flawed.
[22] In the summer of 2010, Vibert returned as honorary president of the party, having plans to move the JDA "from the left to the centre ground of Jersey politics".
[24][25] In the run-up to the October 2011 elections, the three deputies continued to sit as independents, leaving Southern as the only member of the States assembly formally affiliated to a political party.