The prime minister has called for LNP candidate Mal Brough to be disendorsed, in a growing furore over a menu for a party fundraiser that contained crude and sexist references.

Julia Gillard rounded on the opposition leader, Tony Abbott, for standing behind the LNP’s candidate for Fisher. She also implicated Abbott in a “pattern of behaviour” culminating in a “grossly offensive and sexist menu” being produced for a fundraiser for Brough in Brisbane in late March.

“Mr Brough should be disendorsed, that’s what should happen here,” Gillard told reporters in Perth on Wednesday afternoon.

“Let’s go through the pattern of behaviour. Mr Abbott personally has gone and stood next to signs that described me in a sexist way. We’ve had the Young Liberals hosting a function where jokes were cracked about the death of my father. And now, we have Mr Brough and Mr Hockey at a function with this grossly sexist and offensive menu on display,” she said.

“Join the dots.”

But on Wednesday night the restaurant owner said the offending menu had never been displayed publicly at the fundraiser. Joe Richards emailed an apology to Brough, and that email was released subsequently by the leader of the opposition's office.

"I created a mock menu myself as a light-hearted joke, however as I said I never produced them for public distribution," Richards said. "Unfortunately a staff member saw the mock menu, and unbeknownst to myself, posted it on their Facebook. It now appears that a third party for political reasons has distributed it, yet I can reassure you that no such menu was distributed on the night."

Earlier on Wednesday Abbott criticised the offending menu which offered a dish to attendees called “Julia Gillard Kentucky Fried Quail – Small Breasts, Huge Thighs & A Big Red Box”. But he said Brough should not lose preselection for the Fisher federal seat.

Abbott condemned what he termed a “tacky, scatological menu out the front of a Liberal party event” – but he also referenced a previous incident where a joke in poor taste at his expense had been made at a trade union dinner in Canberra.

“Whatever it is, I think we should be better than that. I think we should be appealing to every Australian's best self as we go into this election,” Abbott told reporters during a visit to manufacturer Combat Clothing on the Gold Coast.

Campaigning in south Sydney, Kevin Rudd sprang to the prime minister’s defence over what he described as a “snide, dirty and, I think … sexist trick”.

Rudd said: “Can I just say this about Mr Brough: number one, he’s a former minister of the Howard government. Number two, he’s a highly experienced politician. Number three, he organised the fundraiser which used all these menus. Four, it wasn’t a mistake, he knew the menu was being used. Five, he’s apologised because he’s been found out.

“I think this says everything about Mr Brough. Mr Brough should be doing more than apologising. Mr Brough should be taking a long hard look at himself because this behaviour is not appropriate in the 21st century.”

Brough has apologised. The shadow treasurer, Joe Hockey, who was at the fundraiser, took to Twitter to express his view of the incident. “I don't recall ever seeing any such menu. It is offensive and inappropriate whenever it was put out and it is now,” Hockey tweeted.

At a press conference late on Wednesday, Hockey said the reference on the menu was wrong then, and wrong now. But he queried whether this issue was “the biggest event in Australia today. Come on, seriously?”

Hockey said he wasn’t interested in “sanctimonious lectures” from a prime minister who had “called me a fat man in parliament” and who had on Tuesday branded him and his colleagues “effectively, misogynist pigs”.

The new phase of the gender wars was kicked off initially by the prime minister late on Tuesday with a speech to a women’s event declaring “we don’t want to live in an Australia where abortion again becomes the political plaything of men who think they know better”.

Under sustained pressure over her leadership, and in her strongest public intervention since her now famous misogyny speech, Gillard moved to reframe the September election contest as a referendum on women’s participation in politics and public life. “On that day, 14 September, we are going to make a big decision as a nation. It’s a decision about whether, once again, we will banish women’s voices from our political life,” Gillard declared.

The Coalition lambasted the prime minister’s intervention, and it also attracted criticism from within her own ranks. Two Labor backbenchers, Ed Husic and Stephen Jones, expressed unease that Gillard had raised the issue of abortion so explicitly. Abortion remains a politically sensitive issue in Australia.

Both Husic and Jones are supporters of Kevin Rudd. “I’m not convinced of the wisdom of kicking this into a political debate,” Jones remarked of the change in the political conversation. Husic echoed that assessment in a television interview on Wednesday morning.

Gillard was asked about their comments during her press conference in Perth. “Neither Mr Jones nor Mr Husic were in parliament when Liberal party women rebelled when Tony Abbott was health minister, so concerned were they about the attitude he was taking to RU486.

“I was in parliament. I was the shadow health minister. I saw those Liberal women rebel against Tony Abbott as health minister and, consequently, I think Mr Abbott’s conduct at that time, and the fact that women in his own political party felt the need to rebel, tells you something about Mr Abbott’s attitudes,” she said.

“Mr Jones and Mr Husic weren’t there at the time. I was.”

Abbott was asked during his visit to Combat Clothing whether the Coalition would change the current laws governing abortion. “The short answer is no,” Abbott said.

He accused the prime minister of playing the politics of division.

“I am the father of three daughters. I am the brother of three sisters. The last thing, I think, any political leader should be doing is trying to divide Australians on the basis of class or gender or where people were born – and one of the problems with the current prime minister and the current government is that with no record to run on, they are now playing the politics of division and again I just think we should be better than that,” Abbott said.

Rudd was also asked whether he was pro-choice during his campaign visit to the Sydney seat of Barton. “Abortion policy is run by state governments, first point,” Rudd said.

“The only time in which this matter has come before the federal parliament on a matter relevant to the federal jurisdiction was over the use of RU486. I vote in favour of the use of RU486.”