Mark Latham has mocked TV star Hamish Macdonald after The Project host described the shame and confusion he felt as a gay student at an elite private boys' school.
The NSW One Nation leader downplayed Macdonald's experiences at Scots College in Sydney's eastern suburbs by describing him as 'dripping with privilege'.
Mr Latham claimed homosexuals were 'massively over-represented' in the media and it was 'the greatest con job in the history of politics' that gay people were considered disadvantaged.
Macdonald attended Scots College as a rural boarder from Year 6 to Year 12 and while he became school prefect he was also taunted as a 'p****er'.
Mark Latham has mocked TV star Hamish Macdonald after The Project host described his shame and porn2s.com confusion as a gay student at an elite private boys' school.
Macdonald is pictured with long-term partner Jacob Fitzroy, a manager with accounting firm Deloitte
On April 20, Macdonald penned an opinion piece for Nine Newspapers in which he revealed he had endured 'verbal, psychological and sometimes physical torment' at the Presbyterian school.
The 41-year-old sometime ABC radio presenter wrote he was surprised and disappointed at the Presbyterian Church's proposed ban on gay and sexually active students from holding leadership roles.
The next night Macdonald appeared on Network Ten's The Project to discuss what it was like being a gay teenager at Scots College before he had told anyone he was homosexual.
'When I think back to my time at school, I wonder what a difference it would have made to know that I wasn't the only one,' the former Q+A host told viewers.
'A consequence of being schooled in an environment where being gay is considered thoroughly wrong is that you're left with a deep sense of shame that takes a lifetime to shake.
'Today, I lead a happy, fulfilling and productive life.
I love my partner and am loved in return and I take great pride in the work I do.
'But I'm surprised even still by the extent to which the dark, disruptive shadows of my time at school can creep up on me unexpectedly, casting a pall over my work or home life.'
NSW One Nation leader Mark Latham downplayed Hamish Macdonald's experiences at Scots College in Sydney's eastern suburbs by describing him as 'dripping with privilege'
Mr Latham referred to Macdonald's comments, without naming him, when he was interviewed by broadcaster Chris Smith onon Thursday afternoon.
'The biggest fraud in the history of our politics is the idea that because you're gay or lesbian or bisexual or transgender that somehow you're automatically disadvantaged in life,' he said.
'There's an ABC journalist who's writing in the Herald, who educated at Scots College,' Mr Latham continued.
He then said Macdonald was highly paid for his broadcasting roles and was 'dripping with privilege'.
'[He's saying] I'm the disadvantaged person, I'm the vulnerable [one], I'm the person in need of special government protection because someone said something to him when he was at school.
'It's Scots College.
Most of the people I've represented in public life for decades could never dream of having the money to ever go to Scots College.
'This is the greatest con job in the history of politics that the gays in particular - who are massively over-represented in parliament and the media these days - are somehow disadvantaged.