A former Queensland councillor has criticised the “tinpot little tribunal” that ruled he broke anti-discrimination laws with homophobic slurs, and launched an unfounded attack on its presiding official.

The Gympie gun lobbyist Ron Owen, who has been ordered by the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal (Qcat) to apologise for publicly inciting contempt of gay people, was unrepentant in an interview with Guardian Australia, saying the Qcat member Ann Fitzpatrick “should be looking after her family instead”.

Owen, who received legal representation from the former chief of staff of Queensland’s attorney general while fighting the legal action all the way to the high court, said he would “more than likely be appealing” the Qcat ruling.

Fitzpatrick has given Owen until 9 January to apologise to two former constituents, a lesbian and a transgender bisexual woman, who brought the complaint.

Fitzpatrick found that in a 2005 council report, a community newsletter and another letter reproduced on Owen’s website, he crossed the line from expressing his own contempt of homosexuals to inciting others to feel likewise.

Owen’s apology, to be given privately in writing, must be “genuine, unqualified [and] in his own words”, Fitzpatrick said.

Asked by Guardian Australia if he regretted the offending statements, Owen replied: “I regret the interpretation that the one single tribunal member makes. She got it all wrong. She just tried to do a Solomon sort of thing, you know, cut the baby in half, really.”

Owen challenged the finding that he effectively controlled a website that reproduced a 1998 letter in which it was implied that gay people could be killed because homosexuality was a “declaration of war on a community”. That was despite his admission in cross-examination that he had ordered the letter to be taken down and that Fitzpatrick’s staff found that Owen was the registered trustee of the related business, Owen Guns.

Owen claimed the paperwork was out of date and said: “Mrs Fitzpatrick should be looking after her family instead of making determinations on that basis.”

He still faces a costs hearing before Fitzpatrick, a former commercial barrister.

His marathon legal defence of the discrimination complaint included an unsuccessful bid in the high court last year to have his public expression of homophobic views protected as political communication under the constitution.

He said the barrister Ryan Haddrick, who in 2012 was chief of staff to the state’s attorney general, Jarrod Bleijie, had at times acted for him.

One of the women who pressed the complaint, Richelle Menzies, has told Guardian Australia that gay men in Gympie feared taking legal action because of possible reprisals. Menzies said there had been gay bashings in the town and cafe owners had been targeted by vandals because of their sexuality.

But Owen said he knew of no hate crimes against gay people in Gympie. “It never dawned on me that there was people of their persuasion in Queensland,” he said. “I didn’t have a clue about them.

“I mean, one of them called herself a name I’ve never even heard of,” he said, referring to Rhonda Bruce, a transgender bisexual woman who brought the action with Menzies.

Menzies said she had detected “no change whatsoever” in Owen’s attitude during their eight-year legal battle.

“There are some people in this world whose minds you will never change,” Menzies said. “Whatever he thinks personally is one thing, but as an elected official and representative of the community it is not appropriate to be stating things publicly that are going to impact on his constituents.”

Owen claimed he was vindicated by the fact Qcat dismissed several complaints.

This included finding that he could not be held responsible for a bumper sticker that read “The only right gays have is the right to die”, because the car was not registered in his name.