Shorten out of touch on gay program:Howard

John Howard has accused Opposition Leader Bill Shorten of being out of touch with middle Australia after he labelled critics of a gay and lesbian-focused schools program homophobes.

The Turnbull government has ordered a review of the Safe Schools anti-bullying program following concerns raised by conservative backbenchers including Cory Bernardi.

"To say that anybody who is alarmed about this Safe Schools booklet is a homophobe, really, Mr Shorten, you are out of touch," the former prime minister told Sky News on Sunday.

Mr Shorten and Senator Bernardi exchanged sharp words over the controversial taxpayer-funded program last week.

"At least I'm not a homophobe," Mr Shorten told the outspoken senator.

Mr Howard acknowledged that bullying against homosexuals or transgender people was quite unacceptable and caused an enormous amount of pain and grief.

"But you don't need to be pursuing such a social agenda, as this document is clearly pursuing, in order to deal with bullying," Mr Howard said.