Former ALP heavies Mark Latham and Graham Richardson in fiery TV clash

FORMER Labor leader Mark Latham and ex-Labor powerbroker Graham Richardson last night traded verbal blows in a fiery live TV row, labelling one another a ‘king rat’ and ‘old rotten shyster’.

FORMER Labor leader Mark Latham and ALP luminary Graham Richardson have unleashed on each other on live TV over Latham’s decision to back Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party in a prerecorded robocall with Mr Richardson labelling Latham a “king rat” and Mr Latham calling Richardson an “old rotten shyster”.

The sparks starting flying on Sky News after Richardson attacked Latham over his decision to back One Nation over his own former party. In the recording Latham urged voters to turn their back on Labor because its leader Bill Shorten “just lies.”

Clash.... Graham Richardson and Mark Latham go head to head last night.

“Mark Latham has become a pretty sad and pathetic figure,” Labor frontbencher Jim Chalmers told Sky News on Tuesday.

“I don’t think the people of Morayfield are sitting around their lounge rooms in Origin week waiting for instructions on who to vote for from Mark Latham.”

Last night, former Labor politician turned media commentator Mr Richardson said it was a “tragedy” that Mr Latham had turned his back on the Labor Party to back Hanson.

“The party that built you, the party that made you … the people of Green Valley that contributed to you when you were going to university … they would be rolling in their graves or shaking their heads if still alive,” Mr Richardson said in the heated segment.

“It is a tragedy and it is sad Mark.”

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Mr Latham responded by accusing Mr Richardson of taking blood money from disgraced developer and convicted murderer Ron Medich when he was a lobbyist working for Labor.

“I’ll tell you what’s sad — taking money from Ron Medich as you did when you were a lobbyist,” he said.

“I’ll tell you what’s sad, putting Eddie Obeid in NSW parliament. I’ll tell you what’s sad, having a Swiss bank account.”

Former Labor powerbroker Graham Richardson

and former Labor Leader Mark Latham

Mr Richardson responded that he “never had a Swiss bank account and that was proven”.

Latham kept at Mr Richardson calling him an “old rotten shyster”.

Mr Richardson defended his relationship with Medich who was sentenced to 39 years jail last month for murdering former business partner Michael McGurk.

“(I took money) when Ron Medich was not a criminal and, by the way, I stopped taking money from Ron Medich and only took it from his brother because I didn’t like the people he was mixing with,” he said.

“You are not just the rat of the Labor Party, you are king rat, and I’ll tell you something about king rats. It’s not the case that everyone else changed and poor Mark Latham stayed the same. That’s what you love to claim but you can’t do it”

In a robocall Mr Latham said Labor leader Bill Shorten “just lies”.

There has been speculation Mr Latham will join Pauline Hanson’s One Nation.

In the robocall Mr Latham said Shorten “just lies”.

“I’ve had personal experience with Bill Shorten’s dishonesty. He just lies and lies and lies,” the recording said.

“Whatever you do, don’t reward Shorten’s dishonesty, don’t vote Labor. Please support minor parties and independents to shake up the system and put some honest politics back into Canberra.”

There has been speculation Mr Latham will join One Nation but Senator Hanson explicitly denied any approach had been made on Sky News last night.

Mr Shorten today brushed off the attack, declining to respond to Mr Latham’s smears other than to label them “a sideshow”.

“Mark Latham used to be someone, he’s not anymore,” he told reporters in Tasmania ahead of another by-election in Braddon.

Originally published as Former ALP heavies Mark Latham and Graham Richardson in fiery TV clash