By Phillip Hudson

Political Correspondent

Canberra

March 18 2002

A senior Labor MP has given a damning assessment of the party's health, saying its membership base is in serious decline and that the organisation needs an overhaul.

Federal Labor MP Lindsay Tanner, the member for Melbourne, communications spokesman and a former union official, also warned that the party faced a problem of diminishing diversity in its ranks because too many MPs had a similar background in the labour movement.

The assessment comes in a confidential submission to Bob Hawke and Neville Wran as part of their review of Labor's structure after the federal election loss.

It also includes the view that Labor's proud past "littered with heroes, myths and legends" could make the party appear backward-looking and out of touch when it was over-emphasised.

Mr Tanner said Labor had become "an alien import" in some areas and needed a complete overhaul of its structure to give members more influence and to examine the very nature of Labor as a political organisation.

"The central issue is not the marketing, it is the product. And the product is not merely our policies, it is us," he wrote in the submission. "Our problems are structural, not cyclical. A new coat of paint might help, but restumping is the main priority."

Opposition Leader Simon Crean has vowed to modernise the ALP.

Mr Tanner said the idea of joining a Labor branch had been turned into a mockery by branch-stacking and there was no fulfilment or influence for members.

"For those without political ambitions who simply wish to make a contribution, rank-and-file membership of the ALP is profoundly unappealing," he said. "The Labor Party branch structure has never been particularly vibrant, but it is now in serious decline in many parts of Australia."

Mr Tanner highlighted the federal seat of Aston in Melbourne's eastern suburbs, where the party lost a crucial byelection last July, as one of the crisis areas.

"Membership has fallen well below the critical mass required to sustain a local election campaign and a network of links with the local community," he said.

"Without local ambassadors, without local networks, and without local activists, our party will become an alien import. It should be an established part of local community life."

Mr Tanner said membership troubles created an "astonishingly small" pool from which Labor candidates could be drawn.

Mr Tanner, who led the Federated Clerks Union, said Labor had a problem with the narrow background and life experience of its MPs and the party was at risk of becoming a job agency for aspiring politicians. "The number of MPs who could be described as labour movement professionals has increased substantially," he said. "As someone who has the same background I can hardly complain too loudly, but we need to make a collective effort to increase the diversity background in the Labor caucus."

He called for members to be allowed to vote directly for key party office holders. Branches, he said, should function as community organisations in their own right, train members to become local volunteers and have an automatic right to participate in Labor policy committees and access to frontbenchers.

He said members should be allowed to form a branch around any theme compatible with Labor's platform and objectives, such as a pensioners' branch or health workers' branch.

- with Duncan Bone