Margaret was brought up on a West Australian wheat and sheep farm. Her pre-university gap year as a volunteer with IofC turned into a gap-30-years, mainly in India, Australia, Papua New Guinea, and UK. In 1997 she gained employment in the NHS, becoming Project and Programme Manager for the implementation and development of IT Integrated Patient Care Systems, and later moving to a company supplying IT systems to the NHS. She retired from paid employment in August 2018.