Graham Perrett trained as a teacher and taught in the Darling Downs, the far north of Queensland and Brisbane. In 1993 he graduated in Arts from the University of Queensland and in 1999 completed his Bachelor of Laws at the Queensland University of Technology. Perrett then worked as a solicitor of the Supreme Court of Queensland, an organiser with the Queensland Independent Education Union and a Senior Policy Advisor with the Queensland Government.
In November 2007 Perrett was elected to Federal Parliament as the ALP member for the Queensland seat of Moreton.