Labor MP Peta Murphy has died years after being diagnosed with breast cancer.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, in announcing the death of the 50-year-old, said she was with her husband Rod when she died in their family home earlier on Monday.

She was first diagnosed in 2011, and after recovering, the cancer returned shortly after her 2019 election victory.

She dedicated her time in public life to raising cancer awareness. 

Mr Albanese said his government was "broken-hearted" following Ms Murphy's death.

He praised her for travelling to Canberra last week, where she used a question in the House of Representatives to raise awareness about questions close to her.

 

Peta Murphy sat on the committee scruitinising the Voice to Parliament legislation. (ABC News: Ross Nerdal )

"It was so true to Peta's character that she channelled her personal battle with breast cancer into public policy, advocating always for others: for better treatment, more services and stronger support," Mr Albanese said.

"In 2019, Peta received the news her cancer had returned two weeks prior to being sworn in as an MP. In her remarkable first speech in the Parliament she said: 'I am neither unique nor alone in the fight I am about to take on'.

"In so many wonderful ways, Peta was unique. But as someone who inspired such affection and respect in the hearts of so many, she was never alone."

 

Peta Murphy won her seat in 2019, entering the parliament two weeks after finding out her cancer had returned.(ABC News: Luke Stephenson)

An enthusiastic squash player, Ms Murphy was a senior public defender at Victorian Legal Aid and a barrister prior to entering parliament. 

She was married to her husband Rod Glover for 24 years.

A representative of the Mornington Peninsula, Ms Murphy became an avid dragon boater in recent years and would use Fight Song, Hillary Clinton's 2016 US presidential campaign track, as her pump-up song.

Ms Murphy had a metastatic breast cancer that was treatable but not curable. In recent years, her medication changed from oral chemotherapy to intravenous chemotherapy, which she received three out of every four Fridays, prompting her hair to fall out.

YOUTUBEPeta Murphy's first speech to the House of Representatives in July 2019.

Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan has offered her condolences to Ms Murphy's family.

"When Peta Murphy gave her first speech in Parliament in 2019, she finished with a quote from Pippi Longstocking, the 'strongest girl in the world'. Across her great career, and throughout her long fight, Peta showed us exactly what strong girls — and strong women — are truly capable of," she said.

"Peta undertook a brave and unflinching personal journey in the public eye, but kept turning up for work every day to make other people's lives better. She lived her Labor values as a lawyer and lawmaker, and left behind a legacy."

Kirsten Pilatti, CEO of Breast Cancer Network Australia, said Ms Murphy's maiden speech "publicly shone a very bright light into a dark place for those people living with treatable but incurable breast cancer".

"And while today is a very sad day and we are all grieving, it also is a powerful message to our network to say that every single person living with metastatic disease matters and Peta really helped us bring that to life," Ms Pilatti said.

 

Peta Murphy entered the federal parliament at the 2019 election. (ABC News)

"This is the saddest of days for the Labor family," Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong told the Senate.

"Peta was loved, she was respected by all of us, greatly admired by her community who she represented with passion and determination even through all of her illness.

"Peta's strength was unmatched and she'll be greatly missed by us all."

Ms Murphy was a rare figure in that she was universally liked across the parliament, especially by the parliamentary staff who worked with her on committees.

She was an active member of the parliament's inquires into the Voice to Parliament referendum, and was a leading figure in a parliamentary inquiry into online gambling.

"Peta Murphy conducted herself as an exceptional member of parliament and particularly showed such strength, such grace, such determination during her battle with cancer," Coalition frontbencher Simon Birmingham told the Senate.

"We pay tribute to her."

Labor minister Anika Wells, who sat alongside Ms Murphy when she delivered her first speech in the parliament, described her as "my exceptional friend".

"Immortality sat uncomfortably, concurrently sentient of the injustice she was being cut down in the prime of her life, with a humility that resisted the adoration people constantly wanted to express for her," Ms Wells wrote on Instagram.

"There was much to adore. The authenticity, conviction, tenacity and missile-force wit of distinction among us.

"A disposition for intellectual openness, a generosity for the maltreated, a fierceness loving those lucky enough to be loved by her."