[1][2] She is a Kurin Minang Noongar woman of the Bibulman nation, an Aboriginal Australian people whose traditional lands are located on the southwestern coast of Western Australia.

[12][13][14] In 2016, McGlade began campaigning for a stand-alone national action plan to address violence against women, and her advocacy was successful before a number of UN treaty bodies and expert mechanisms.

In 2020 she called for a Council on Violence Against Aboriginal Women and Children in collaboration with the national body Our Watch[citation needed] (founded by Natasha Stott Despoja in 2013[15]).

"[17] While a cultural heritage bill was proposed in Western Australian Parliament in 2021 which attempted to prevent such situations in the future, McGlade rejected its legitimacy and claimed Indigenous people had not been sufficiently consulted on the issue.

[18] Also in 2021, she voiced concerns about Bruce Pascoe's book Dark Emu, saying that it was "ideological and subjective", "not very truthful or accurate" and "misleading and offensive to Aboriginal people and culture".