Saturday is the 53rd anniversary of Gough Whitlam becoming leader of the Labor Party in 1967, after the ALP had suffered eight straight election losses. Labor’s 1966 primary vote of 40 per cent – its lowest in 30 years – looks OK against the 33.3 per cent at last May’s election.

Gough Whitlam, second from right, and part of his cabinet, Clyde Cameron, Jim Cairns and Lionel Murphy, in 1974.

Whitlam had been in Parliament for just over 14 years. Less than six years later, after another election loss, he led Labor to government in 1972, after 23 years in opposition. The victory owed much to Whitlam’s monumental campaign to reform the ALP into a palatable alternative to the Coalition.

In 1965, as deputy leader, Whitlam had noted that the 36 delegates to the ALP’s national conference that year comprised 15 officials of trade unions, five officials of the party, nine federal parliamentarians, four state parliamentarians and two local government heads. Only one was self-employed. That is, 35 of the 36 were “sustained by the Labor movement”.

Whitlam identified, dissected and articulated the need for the the party machine and, more importantly, its parliamentary representatives, to be more reflective of the community, and Labor voters.