Acclaimed children’s author Mem Fox says she will celebrate by “opening champagne” if her politician daughter, Chloë, is ousted from her seat in South Australia’s March election.

Fox, who has been on a national tour to promote her new picture book Baby Bedtime, said Chloë’s long work hours, coupled with life as a single-mum, had taken a toll on the 42-year-old MP, leaving her “exhausted”.

Fox and husband, Malcolm, have stepped up to help raise Chloë’s son, 3½-year-old Theo, she said.

“Parliamentarians sometimes sit until 11pm at night. It is an absolutely shit job. It is relentless, it is thankless. Why anybody would want to go into it, I do not know. And if Chloë loses the election we will be opening champagne!” she said.

“She’s absolutely exhausted… She’s a Minister for Transport Services, she’s a Minister Assisting the Minister for the Arts. Because she’s had a young child for the last 3½ years she’s sleepless for a start and then she’s had this job on top of it.”

Fox said it appeared that Chloë, a former school teacher and journalist who has held the beachside seat of Bright since 2006, was facing an unwinnable election after the redrawing of electoral boundaries. The redistribution has changed Bright from a 0.4 per cent Labor seat to a 0.1 per cent notionally Liberal seat.

“It does look as though she actually cannot win because they’ve redrawn the boundaries of the electorate so she’s been pushed forward into Liberal territory, which means she’s our Labor member of a Liberal seat,” she said.

“So at the election, it’s almost impossible for her to win. We’re all being very cool-headed about the whole thing. We’re seeing it with clear eyes.

“Of course she’ll regret losing if she loses, but she will also be able to get a life.”

As a grandmother, Fox said she felt privileged to have had so much involvement in Theo’s young life after he was born eight weeks’ premature in January 2010.

“Because Chloë is a politician and because she’s a single parent, we are more like parents than grandparents,” she said.

“Every single day of the week, we see him for hours – every single day of the week, some days all day.”

Chloë Fox did not respond to questions about her mother’s claims that she was “exhausted” and that her family would rejoice if she loses her seat at election.

But a State Government spokesman simply said: “Mums are Mums”.

The spokesman declined to say if Chloë Fox was coping well juggling her Cabinet positions and personal life. He did not answer questions about whether the MP believed recent criticisms, including being blamed for Adelaide’s public transport woes and last month’s revelation that she had 11 public artworks from the Art Gallery for SA in her office, were warranted.

“Minister Fox is recontesting the seat of Bright at the upcoming election and will continue to work tirelessly for the people of her electorate both as a Minister and as their local Member of Parliament,” he said.

“She has never taken the people of Bright for granted and will continue to campaign to secure every possible vote.”

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