‘Far from PM’: ALP calls out former leader Mark Latham

Key ALP figures have accused Mark Latham of betrayal and attacked his record.

Key ALP figures have accused Mark Latham of betrayal and attacked his record after the former Labor leader this week recorded a robocall message for One Nation branding Bill Shorten a compulsive liar.

They say he botched the 2004 election campaign and depressed the party’s vote.

Mr Shorten yesterday dismissed Mr Latham’s decision to write and record the robocall message for Pauline Hanson ahead of the Longman by-election as a “sideshow” while opposition Treasury spokesman Chris Bowen described Mr Latham as “one of the great Labor rats of history”.

The criticism followed a heated exchange between Mr Latham and former ALP powerbroker Graham Richardson on Sky News on Monday night in which Mr Richardson said Labor supporters would be “rolling in their graves” after having supported the career of the “king rat” and “shyster”.

Labor’s finance spokesman, Jim Chalmers, said it took a “fair bit” to get Mr Richardson “fired up” and suggested Mr Latham had become a “pretty sad and pathetic figure searching in vain for relevance wherever he can find it”.

“We’re not especially surprised or especially troubled to see him pop up in Longman in cahoots with Pauline Hanson,” he said.

Campaigning in Tasmania in the electorate of Braddon — one of the five Super Saturday seats being contested on July 28 — Mr Shorten said Mr Latham “used to be someone”.

“He’s not any more. So I’m not going to waste any time and energy on the sideshows,” he said.

Mr Shorten also took aim at One Nation, saying a vote for Pauline Hanson in the Longman electorate was a vote for Malcolm Turnbull.

Mr Bowen said “hard-working Labor Party branch members” had “put the hat around to find the funds to help Mark Latham through university”.

He said Mr Latham was “playing footsie” with Senator Hanson, arguing that “those two charlatans deserve each other”.

Deputy Labor Leader Tanya Plibersek said Mr Latham had been “pretty far from becoming prime minister” in an attack on his time as opposition leader against John Howard in the lead-up to the 2004 election. “He depressed the Labor vote when he was Labor leader,” Ms Plibersek said.

Mr Latham yesterday recorded another message as part of a separate robocall campaign for the Liberal Democrats, of which he is a member, also targeting the seat of Longman ahead of the key Super Saturday by-elections on July 28.

However, speaking on Ben Fordham’s 2GB radio program in Sydney, Mr Latham did not rule out joining the One Nation party amid speculation he could take the party’s No 1 position on the NSW Senate ticket.

“I’ve had offers from four different parties,” Mr Latham said. “I’m considering those … It’s a matter for family consideration as well, so all of that is still active.”

Mr Latham said Mr Shorten was a “natural-born liar” who privately had urged him to support a free-trade agreement with the US in 2004 despite campaigning against it for his “members’ consumption”.