Megan Levy Breaking news reporter
June 7, 2013 - 1:56PM
Latham's verbal attack on Rudd
Former federal Labor leader Mark Latham accuses Kevin Rudd of being "addicted to media attention" on 2UE's Paul Murray show.
Former federal Labor leader Mark Latham has unleashed a remarkable verbal assault on his former party colleagues, branding Kevin Rudd a "once-in-a-century egomaniac" and likening Joel Fitzgibbon to a "giggling schoolkid effectively peeing on his foot".
You'll never see his like again as long as we live in Australian politics
With less than 100 days until the federal election, Latham said the antics of Rudd and Fitzgibbon this week pointed to the absolute disintegration of the modern Labor Party, which he said was ruled by warlords more intent on manoeuvring, plotting and backstabbing rather than representing their constituents to the best of their ability.
On the attack: Mark Latham, right, called Kevin Rudd an "egomaniac". Photo: Reuters
Latham said Rudd's re-entry in the public fray on Thursday night, when he participated in a nationally televised interview, was a calculated move from an "egomaniac" and "lunatic".
In the interview on the ABC's 7.30, Rudd denied destabilising Julia Gillard but refused to rule out a return to the leadership. Instead, he revived his February 2012 formula of accepting the caucus decision in the leadership ballot, rather than his March 2013 pledge to never again accept the leadership.
"Let's make it absolutely clear: Rudd knows that every time he gets in the media cycle, he knocks Gillard down a notch or two in the polls," Latham told 2UE's Paul Murray on Friday.
"This is deliberate sabotage, an absolute replay, groundhog day, on 2010.
"Rudd knows that all of this is damaging the party. He is a lunatic. I look at him on the TV, Paul, and I've got to say, this bloke's nuts. I look at him and I think, this bloke is certifiable. This bloke is absolute nuts. He is addicted to the media in a way that damages his own interests and hurts the political party that he otherwise claims to love. I mean, this is absolutely crazy."
Rudd also used the interview to justify his own public campaigning, calling on Labor MPs not to "haul up the white flag" and not to blame him for their dire political situation.
It followed news this week that at least two MPs - Alan Griffin and Daryl Melham - had started packing up their offices in case they lose their seats in the September 14 election.
Latham said the MPs, who were both Rudd supporters, were packing up their offices for no other reason than to tell the media about it.
"Griffin for a long time has been his [Rudd's] campaign manager, so his own campaign manager is the bloke putting up the white flag, and Rudd has got so much front, so much absurdity about him, he goes out and says 'Oh, Labor people shouldn't put up the white flag'. It's his own person who's doing it and he thinks 'Oh nobody knows that'," Latham said.
"I mean this guy is ... a once-in-a-century egomaniac. You'll never see his like again as long as we live in Australian politics. What the Labor Party does with him, they should have expelled him three years ago, quite frankly."
He also took aim at NSW Labor faction chief Joel Fitzgibbon, who this week ridiculed Labor spin doctors' instructions on how government MPs should respond to questions about the latest opinion polls.
Fitzgibbon, who quit as Government Whip this year because he backed Kevin Rudd over Ms Gillard, went on national television and mocked the "talking points" distributed by the Prime Minister's office to MPs who would be interviewed by journalists.
"I brought the manual with me. I'll see what it says," a laughing Mr Fitzgibbon told Seven's Sunrise, rifling through the papers.
"It says, 'Polls come and go and the only poll that matters is on election day'."
Latham said a former leader like Paul Keating would have "absolutely throttled the bastard" for such a cheap political stunt.
"Throttled him with good reason," Latham said.
Such situations arose because Labor was no longer a cohesive political party, Latham claimed, but rather a loose federation of factional and sub-factional warlords who "most of the time bicker with each other".
"This is the inevitable result - clowns like Fitzgibbon, a giggling schoolkid effectively peeing on his foot thinking it's clever," Latham said.
"Well look, at the end of the day, all he's doing is peeing on his own foot."
Mark Latham lays into 'once-in-a-century egomaniac' Kevin Rudd
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