I don’t know if anyone writes Christmas cards anymore but former Prime Minister Julia Gillard does and each year she sends one to Maria Ljubic, head cleaner at Australian Parliament House.

This may seem odd but when you meet 71-year-old Maria, who’s worked at Parliament House since it opened in 1988, you understand why everyone has such affection for her.

As we walk down the 300-metre-long corridors, every passerby says hello and one lady even shows Maria her new manicure of red and green nail polish (for the Senate and House of Representatives). Maria’s office wall is adorned with photos of her with former prime ministers.

She’s not one to name drop but she once shook the hand of former US President Bill Clinton when he visited Parliament House and she’s also been in the presence of George W. Bush and Barack Obama. But it is the late Queen Elizabeth II that is the best story of all.

When Maria first started her cleaning job at Parliament House in 1988, her boss asked her to dash outside and vacuum the red carpet – just minutes before the Queen was due to arrive.

“It was last-minute, “Maria said. “My boss says, ‘Maria quick, there’s a storeroom here, grab a (vacuum) backpack and go out’. I’m like ‘oh my God’, everybody was outside waiting already. I was a bit nervous, yeah.”

When she emerged out of the front doors, the young Maria, who was 36 years old at the time, was mistaken for the Queen and a crowd of thousands erupted. Then she started vacuuming.

“All the crowd’s waiting outside and this lady’s coming out with a backpack,” Maria laughed. “Oh my God, it was very exciting.”

Maria, a Croatian immigrant, came here when she was only 18 with very little English. And look at her now, rubbing shoulders with world leaders like nobody’s business.

“We are privileged working in this house,” she said. “To see all the visitors coming from overseas is really exciting – but it’s more exciting to get everything ready making sure it’s really clean for the people.”

Maria takes immense pride in overseeing the cleaning of Parliament House’s 4,500 rooms and 22 kilometres of corridors – the largest building in the southern hemisphere. Even as we walk, she stops to remove a dead bogong moth from the floor and give it to a waiting magpie outside in the courtyard.

“I’m just hoping we don’t have bogong moths again, they are a disaster for the building,” she said. “If they come this is the time (October) so hopefully they don’t. We haven’t seen them for a long time, I don’t know why, my theory is the warm weather.”

Maria’s high security clearance means she is one of only four people to have a swipe card to enter the prime minister’s office (and no, Anthony Albanese doesn’t leave a mess, in case you were wondering.) What’s most impressive about Maria is that she’s outlasted nine prime ministers (ten if you count Kevin Rudd twice during Labor’s revolving leadership period).

The funny thing is, Maria is not interested in the political drama and gossip of the house she cleans.

“That’s all exciting but we just keep to our jobs, not worry about what’s happening here,” she said. “My husband says to me sometimes, ‘I was watching TV, did you see this happen?’ I say, ‘I don’t have time to see what’s happening here, I’m busy’. I’m not too much into politics, they do their job, I do my job – I don’t have to deal with anything like that, thank God. It would not be an easy job.”

Maria starts her day at 6am to clean the PM’s office and the chambers before the politicians arrive. When former Prime Minister Tony Abbott was in office, he had a habit of coming to his office early so Maria had to work quietly around him.

Maria oversees a team of 20 cleaning staff and she knocks off at 2.30pm. The nightshift crew starts all over again at midnight. It’s never-ending. Maria’s domain is the floor – all 250,000 square kilometers of it. She superbly maintains the expensive parquetry (native hardwood) floors and the foyer’s white marble and 345-million-year-old black limestone (only distilled water is used to clean these expensive stones).

Her work never goes unnoticed and, at the end of every year, her work is praised in the chamber.

“Oh my God, that’s how special it is because it’s in the Hansard,” Maria said.

“All our girls were invited last Christmas to the courtyard with the PM for afternoon tea, that was really nice. Julia sends me a Christmas card each year, she’s such a lovely person. In 2018, my mum passed away just before Christmas and I got her card, that made me really emotional and I couldn’t believe it.”

Parliament House is quite a family affair for the Ljubics because Maria’s husband worked on the construction of the building in the 1980s and her brother-in-law owned the company tasked with excavating the top half of Capital Hill. 

She says her favourite space is the Members’ Hall with its reflective pool and soothing sound of flowing water. There is no thought of retirement for the 71-year-old, however. With such friends in high places, why would she?

“This is a most beautiful house,” Maria said. “I’m so humbled. Everyone’s looking at us like a part of the family here. I’m so happy, how can I finish this job. I have to keep coming.”

Canberra Daily is keen to hear from you about a story idea in the Canberra and surrounding region. Click here to submit a news tip.