Matt O'Sullivan (politician)


Matthew Anthony O'Sullivan is an Australian politician. He has been a Liberal Party of Australia member of the Australian Senate since 2019.
Prior to entering politics, O'Sullivan was a tradesman and then a youth worker. He began working for mining billionaire Andrew Forrest's Minderoo Foundation in 2008, and at the time of his election was chief operating officer of Forrest's indigenous youth employment scheme GenerationOne. He is associated with the Perth-based evangelical Nations Church.
He was elected to the Senate at the 2019 federal election from the marginal third position on the Liberal ticket, after winning a close and contentious Liberal preselection contest. In his first speech to parliament in July 2019, he argued for the extension of the Forrest-backed Cashless Welfare Card across Australia and for a major overhaul of the federal employment services system, including replacing unnecessary Jobactive appointments with online reporting. In October 2019, he claimed at a Senate inquiry into the government's "Robodebt" scheme for pursuing alleged welfare debts that the label was a "misnomer". In November 2019, he became a member of a new cross-party parliamentary working group into indigenous constitutional recognition and a "voice to government"