Lawrie;
It is not wise to mention "that" acronym here, so I'll be brief in my support for "that great Australian" without mentioning him or it.
Despite what you assert, the rot set in when they began to accept gratuities in the form of expenses and free advertising in the early 2000 years. The folks were not amused and demonstrated their objection by refusing to renew membership. In fact it crashed from 4,000 odd shortly after the then President claimed that number at a Senate Estimates under oath.
The era you claim prior to have had some "respect" evolved historically positive until another figure at the helm, not "the great Australian", began to count affiliates memberships as heads to bolter numbers. Neither in your mentioned era or later did they ever have the claimed 8,000 members.
There was a decline when the subscriptions went up fairly dramatically, but had this not occurred the financial crash that came about in about mid 2000 would have occurred sooner. This crash came about because of mismanagement and waste during the ego trips mentioned.
There were people actively reading and answering NPRM's up until then and their input was politically ridiculed until the organization became neutered. This also may have contributed to some "disrespect" although I can think of more blunt terms.
As I said previously not in any way related to the person you want to blame.
I apologize for "baiting" you and it was tongue in cheek.
The said acronym is now 100% "compliant" and hardly represents a bold and energetic opposition to all the
coming out of Canberra then or now.
Peter P would be out of his depth today and is history that would never have evolved today.