Mary Anderson

Mary Patricia Anderson (17 March 1887 – 18 February 1966) was one of the first two women appointed to the New Zealand Legislative Council (upper house).

Early life Anderson was born in 1887 at Moonlight, a goldmining settlement near Atarau. She was one of eight children of Irish Catherine Flaherty and Swedish miner Anton Anderson. Anderson attended Greymouth District High School. In 1948, she became the first woman to chair a New Zealand parliamentary committee.

Anderson strongly supported Labour's welfare state. In 1950, she sat out a parliamentary committee to consider the reintroduction of capital punishment, describing the practice as "barbarous".

Life after politics In 1950 she was elected to the Grey Hospital Board. She served on the Board for 12 years.

In 1956 she retired as secretary-treasurer of the Greymouth branch of the Labour Party, but remained an honorary vice president well into the 1960s.

She died at Greymouth in 1966; she had never married.