The ALP successfully sold themselves as a party which would meet the demands of redneck trade unionists and feminist academics alike.
By 2004 however, the the Australian Democrats and Greens had grabbed the loony left ground, and unions were losing membership. And relevance.
Realizing that redneck feminist academics were a shrinking voting force anyway the ALP was forced to make a decision about which way to jump. So far they still haven't. But that didn't stop them appointing a multi-millionaire as their leader in 2006.
See