Mr [MARK Latham], 44, said last night that despite Senator [Stephen Conroy] being one of the “culprits” in Wilton’s death he was promoted by the Labor Party.

Mr Latham also claimed Senator Conroy became abusive towards fellow Labor colleague Stephen Smith after the West Australian MP agreed to help Mr Latham campaign during last year’s election.

Mr Latham and Senator Conroy fell out in the lead up to the October election, when Mr Latham announced plans to seek amendments to the free trade agreement between the US and Australia.

MARK Latham has accused Labor’s deputy leader in the Senate, Stephen Conroy, of being partly to blame for the political environment which led to the suicide of Victorian MP Greg Wilton five years ago.

Mr Latham, 44, said last night that despite Senator Conroy being one of the “culprits” in Wilton’s death he was promoted by the Labor Party.

“In that episode, failing to support Greg, Stephen Conroy, after the next election, he was promoted to deputy leader in the Senate. For his sins he was promoted,” Mr Latham said.

In June 2000, Wilton killed himself on his second attempt. He gassed himself in his car in bushland outside Melbourne, less than three weeks after he attempted to take the lives of his two young children in the same way.

Mr Latham said Wilton had experienced a marriage breakdown and an “incident was made public”. “He was in a devastated state, suffering depression and he needed people to support him and help him,” he said on the ABC‘s Enough Rope.

“Far from supporting him, some of those, I suppose they became enemies inside the party, put around in the media that he was going to lose his pre-selection. He would be out of his seat.”

Mr Latham said by that stage Wilton had nothing left in his life except his spot in parliament. “That triggered his suicide. It was a tragedy that instead of Labor people supporting him from the top down, the culture was he was a political number rather than a human life.”

Mr Latham said the incident illustrated that there was something fundamentally sick within the ALP.

Senator Conroy could not be contacted last night.

Mr Latham also claimed Senator Conroy became abusive towards fellow Labor colleague Stephen Smith after the West Australian MP agreed to help Mr Latham campaign during last year’s election.

“I can honestly say I have never had an agenda like Stephen Conroy in the last election campaign,” Mr Latham told The Australian.

“When Stephen Smith was coming on to the campaign team to do the advancing and all that, the deputy leader in the Senate rang him up to abuse him, saying, `What are you doing helping Latham?’ I have never had an agenda like that.”

Mr Latham and Senator Conroy fell out in the lead up to the October election, when Mr Latham announced plans to seek amendments to the free trade agreement between the US and Australia.

After the defeat, Mr Latham accused Senator Conroy of treachery as increasingly damaging stories about his leadership appeared in the media.

Also published on news.com.au