Katherine Victoria O'Regan (née Newton, 24 May 1946 – 2 May 2018) was a New Zealand politician. She was a member of parliament from 1984 to 1999, representing the National Party. She served as a minister for the National Government for six of those years.

Early life

Katherine Victoria Newton was born to farming parents at Te Mata, on the West Coast of the North Island and attended Hamilton Girls' High School. She chose a nursing career but left after two years due to suffering from back problems. After leaving nursing, O'Regan was involved in community organisations like the

Plunket Society The Royal New Zealand Plunket Trust provides a range of free services aimed at improving the development, health and wellbeing of children under the age of five within New Zealand, where it is commonly known simply as Plunket. Its mission is ...

, SPELD (a non-profit organisation that supports people with

dyslexia Dyslexia (), previously known as word blindness, is a learning disability that affects either reading or writing. Different people are affected to different degrees. Problems may include difficulties in spelling words, reading quickly, wri ...

) and the Hamilton Speech Therapy Association.

Political career

O'Regan was a voting delegate for the National Party in the Raglan electorate candidate selection ahead of the 1975 election, where she supported

Marilyn Waring Dame Marilyn Joy Waring (born 7 October 1952) is a New Zealand public policy scholar, international development consultant, former politician, environmentalist, feminist and a principal founder of feminist economics. In 1975, aged 23, she bec ...

. O'Regan would work for Waring as her electoral agent for eight years. She was elected to the Waipa County Council in 1977 and served as a county councillor for eight years; she was the first woman to be elected to the council. When Waring, then representing the Waipa electorate, retired from Parliament, O'Regan was selected as the new National Party candidate for the electorate in 1984. She held Waipa for twelve years until it was abolished in 1996.

In Opposition, 1984–1990

The National Government was defeated at the 1984 election. On her entry to Parliament, O'Regan sought to highlight the plight of children with specific learning disabilities by introducing a private members bill seeking recognition by the education system of children with these disabilities. It was not successful, but the bill was carried over by the Labour Party in Government. It was finally discharged after 1990.

In Government, 1990–1999

National regained the government benches in 1990. In the Fourth National Government, O'Regan was appointed as a Minister outside of Cabinet, as Minister of Consumer Affairs, Associate Minister of Health, Associate Minister of Social Welfare and Associate Minister of Women's Affairs. These remained her portfolios until the 1996 election; she additionally served as Minister of Youth Affairs in 1996. As Associate Minister of Health, she amended the Human Rights Act to outlaw discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and having organisms in the body which might cause disease and established a free breast cancer screening programme. In 1993, O'Regan was awarded the

New Zealand Suffrage Centennial Medal The New Zealand Suffrage Centennial Medal 1993 was established by Royal Warrant on 1 July 1993. It was created to commemorate Women's suffrage in New Zealand and to recognize those New Zealand and Commonwealth citizens who had made a significant ...

. In 1994, O'Regan led the New Zealand Delegation to the United Nations Population and Development Conference in Cairo and also gave the Second Country Report to

CEDAW The Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) is an international treaty adopted in 1979 by the United Nations General Assembly. Described as an international bill of rights for women, it was instituted ...

at the United Nations in New York. Ahead of the 1996 general election, the Waipa electorate was disestablished. O'Regan contested the Tauranga electorate against the former National Party MP for Tauranga,

Winston Peters Winston Raymond Peters (born 11 April 1945) is a New Zealand politician. He has led the political party New Zealand First since he founded it in 1993, and since November 2023 has served as the 25th Minister of Foreign Affairs (New Zealand), ...

, who was contesting the electorate under his New Zealand First Party. O'Regan was unsuccessful in this election but remained in Parliament as a

list MP A list MP is a member of parliament (MP) elected from a party list rather than a geographic electoral district. The place in Parliament is due to the number of votes the party won, not to votes received by the MP personally. This occurs only in ...

. With the National Party forming a coalition government with New Zealand First, O'Regan did not continue as a minister and was instead appointed the Chairperson of the Internal Affairs select committee from 1996 to 1999. O'Regan continued her interest in population and development issues by establishing, with the help of Family Planning International, a New Zealand Parliamentarians' Group on Population and Development. In the 1999 general election, she again challenged Peters, and came within 62 votes of defeating him—had she won, the

New Zealand First New Zealand First (), commonly abbreviated to NZ First or NZF, is a political party in New Zealand, founded and led by Winston Peters, who has served three times as Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand, deputy prime minister. The party has form ...

party would have lost all parliamentary representation. Labour's candidate

Margaret Wilson Margaret Anne Wilson (born 20 May 1947) is a New Zealand lawyer, academic and former Labour Party politician. She served as Attorney-General from 1999 to 2005 and Speaker of the House of Representatives from 2005 to 2008, during the Fifth ...

, who came third in the electorate, requested a recount. The final result was a 63 votes majority for Peters. O'Regan attempted to oust Peters from the electorate by encouraging voters to vote tactically, and vote for her rather than Labour's Wilson. However, Peters was re-elected but with a much reduced margin. Unlike in 1996, O'Regan was not high enough on National's

party list An electoral list is a grouping of candidates for election, usually found in proportional or mixed electoral systems, but also in some plurality electoral systems. An electoral list can be registered by a political party (a party list) or can c ...

to remain in Parliament and thus retired from politics.

Later career

In the 2002 Queen's Birthday and Golden Jubilee Honours, O'Regan was appointed a

Companion of the Queen's Service Order The King's Service Order () established by royal warrant (document), royal warrant of Queen regnant, Queen Elizabeth II on 13 March 1975, is used to recognise "valuable voluntary service to the community or meritorious and faithful services to t ...

for public services. She was the chair of the

Te Awamutu Te Awamutu is a town in the Waikato, Waikato region in the North Island of New Zealand. It is the council seat of the Waipā District and serves as a service town for the farming communities which surround it. Te Awamutu is located some south ...

Community Public Relations Organisation. She was Chair of the Human Ethics in Research Committee for eight years at Waikato Institute of Technology and served on the New Zealand Law Society Waikato/Bay of Plenty Complaints Committee.

Political views

O'Regan was a council member of Family Planning New Zealand. She favoured compulsory sex education from age ten and condom vending machines in all secondary schools and public toilets. In an obituary, her daughter Susan O'Regan described her mother as a

Royalist A royalist supports a particular monarch as head of state for a particular kingdom, or of a particular dynastic claim. In the abstract, this position is royalism. It is distinct from monarchism, which advocates a monarchical system of gove ...

, feminist, and strong believer in equal rights.

Personal life

O'Regan has two children to her first husband Neil O'Regan, whom she married in 1968. The couple divorced; O'Regan married former National MP Michael Cox in 1992. O'Regan was diagnosed, through the free screening programme she had established as Associate Minister of Health, with breast cancer in 2008. She died of her illness on 2 May 2018.