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A mother-of-three who was famously first elected to the federal parliament in 2013 with a newborn after the original ALP candidate was dumped, she laughed off the interaction on Wednesday morning, picking up her daughter as she continued with the televised interview. She was speaking with Sunrise’s Nat Barr from the front deck of her Melbourne home riffing on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s trip to Washington DC and new rules for cash at supermarkets and petrol stations. “Nat, sorry, I’ve got a little visitor here with me, my four-year-old has just come in from the kitchen to visit. Would you like to wave hello, baby G? Do you want to wave hello, baby G? Do you want to wave hello, darling?,’’ Ms O’Neil said. “Come up here. You can wave to the camera, sweetie.” Get all the latest Australian news as it happens — download the news.com.au app direct to your phone. In a scene reminiscent of the ‘BBC dad footage’ – when Robert Kelly, an associate professor of political science at Pusan National University in South Korea was interrupted by several surprise visitors – Ms O’Neil simply batted on. “Clare, can we hear from Greta? Where would you like to spend her pocket money?,’’ Nat Barr quipped. Ms O’Neil has previously discussed her struggles as a working mum with three young kids. “When I had my first baby, I was back at work full time at 8-weeks. Like many working mums, I pretended it was a breeze,’’ she said. “But in reality, it was too soon for me and too soon for my baby. I was stressed and anxious. I struggled with nursing, and the only reason it was all possible was because my partner and my mother changed their arrangements to accommodate the requirements of my job as an MP. “I’m well aware that most families don’t have that flexibility. So any policy which would force mums back to work when they’re not ready, I’m going to stand up and fight against.” She’s also spoken of how parenting has changed as she added to her family. “Greta, our third child, has been a very special child for us. She has been parented very differently than the first two,’’ she said. “On your third, you don’t worry about things the way you did before. You never sweat the small stuff. And you know how quickly each moment of childhood flashes by. So she has grown up deeply loved, but independent and robust. “And knowing she would be our last little baby has been special too. We have cherished and held onto every tiny moment of joy and happiness. She is glorious. Confident, strong willed, charming, funny, loving and kind.” Ms O’Neil has previously stated that she was dedicated to two jobs – her work as an MP and being a mum to Elvis, 10, Louis, 7, and baby Greta. She said this wouldn’t be possible without her husband Brendan, mother Anne, and their “village of support”. “I don’t have any balance in my life,” she admits. “All I do is work and look after my kids. I don’t do anything else.” When parliament sits in Canberra, she will often rise at 4.30am and then work until 9.30pm. “When I do morning TV, my husband sits up with all the kids and watches it. They wave at the TV and say ‘hi mum’ – sometimes I’m in the front yard,” she says with a laugh. “What I’m experiencing is a really common thing for Australian mums because it’s very normal now to work. “There’s a lot of pressure to work full time because the cost of living is such a pressure for families. “I remember having my first child and being quite apologetic about the requirements of that … like constantly apologising for having to feed a tiny baby who was 11 weeks old when I was elected to parliament. “If politics is not a profession where you can be a good mum, and have a senior role in a government, they’re not going to be able to find people to engage with this.” At the height of an Optus data breach last year, which affected 10 million Australians, Ms O’Neil revealed she took a day of leave from the parliament when one of her children needed an operation. “I am not going to let my child have an operation without me. And no one who I work with questioned that decision for one single second,” she said.
