Mary-Jo Fisher

Senator Mary Jo Fisher grew up on her family’s grain and sheep farm near Beverley in Western Australia.

Senator MJ went to boarding school and university in Perth, graduating from the University of Western Australia with a Law degree.

She enjoyed a brief (but good!) stint as a lawyer with a large Perth law firm, before spending over seven years helping farmers with workplace relations and policy advice while working for farming organisations in WA and NSW.

After moving to SA, she spent over six years in senior policy roles in the SA bureaucracy and for successive Federal Workplace Relations Ministers in the Howard Government.

For more than three years, she helped SA’s businesses with workplace issues, as a general manager at Business SA.

With a vacancy created by the retirement of former Senator and Minister Amanda Vanstone, MJ became a Senator in 2007.

Senator MJ actively pursues issues critical to South Australians, including the better use, reuse, collection and storage of water. She has a keen interest in communications and workplace relations policy, particularly for small business, regional communities and primary producers.

Since her election to the Senate, Senator MJ has participated in a number of inquiries of direct relevance to South Australians including into the Murray Darling Basin, the National Broadband Network and major changes to workplace relations.

Together with her husband John, Senator MJ continues her family’s farming tradition, through the production of grain and cattle at their farm at Lucindale in South Australia’s South East.

Senator MJ is currently the Chair of the Senate Standing References Committee on Environment, Communication and the Arts.