Damien O'Connor

Damien Peter O'Connor (born 16 January 1958) is a New Zealand Labour Party politician who served as Minister of Agriculture, Minister for Biosecurity, Minister for Trade and Export Growth, Minister for Land Information and Minister for Rural Communities in the Sixth Labour Government.

He previously served as a cabinet minister in the Fifth Labour Government.

O'Connor was born in Westport in 1958.

He attended primary school in his home town before going on to St Bede's College, Christchurch, a Roman Catholic school, and Lincoln University.

Before becoming an MP, he worked in a variety of jobs in farming and tourism.

During a five-year stint in Australia, he worked as a machinery operator and in sales.

On his return to New Zealand he established Buller Adventure Tours, an adventure tourism company, which he owned and operated in a partnership.

He had been a member of Parliament since 1993 and represented the West Coast-Tasman electorate.

He is now on the Labour list.

He was first elected to Parliament in the 1993 election, recapturing the West Coast seat for Labour after the upset victory of National's Margaret Moir in the 1990 election.

When Helen Clark successfully challenged Mike Moore for the party leadership after the election, O'Connor supported Moore.

Unlike other MPs who entered Parliament in 1993, O'Connor was not named a minister in Clark's first ministry in 1999.

He was, however, appointed as chair of the Primary Production select committee.

He won the reconfigured West Coast-Tasman seat in the 1996 election, and was the MP for the electorate until he lost it to National's Chris Auchinvole during the 2008 election.

At this election O'Connor also stood as a list candidate for the first time since 1996; however, his position of 37 was too low for him to return to Parliament as a Labour Party list MP immediately.

After the 2002 election he was appointed an associate minister in four portfolios: agriculture, health, racing and rural affairs.

He succeeded Annette King as Minister for Racing in a 2003 reshuffle.

After the 2005 election, in what would become the final term of the Fifth Labour Government, O'Connor was promoted to be Minister of Corrections and Minister of Tourism.

He lost the Corrections role in 2007, following calls for his resignation over the previous year over the murder of Liam Ashley in a prison van and a scandal where he was found to have brought a suspended prison officer on a parliamentary rugby tour.

At the 2008 general election, the Labour government was defeated by the National Party and O'Connor lost the West-Coast Tasman electorate to National Party list MP Chris Auchinvole by 971 votes.

O'Connor eventually returned to Parliament after the retirement of former deputy leader Michael Cullen in May 2009.

In Opposition between 2009 and 2017, O'Connor held various spokesperson roles including agriculture, biosecurity, fisheries, food safety, primary industries and rural affairs.

He retook West-Coast Tasman for Labour in 2011 and has held the seat since, defending challenges from former Westland District Mayor Maureen Pugh in 2014 and 2017.

O'Connor was the Facilitator of the Fishing Subsidy negotiations at the 12th World Trade Organisation Conference and delivered an agreement with new rules barring countries from subsidising illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing.

At the 2022 Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (APEC) forum ministers’ meeting, O'Connor joined a staged walkout when the Russian Minister spoke, with the shared statement including “We condemn in the strongest terms, the unprovoked war of aggression by Russia against Ukraine."

In early July 2023, O'Connor accompanied Prime Minister Chris Hipkins to Brussels for the signing of the New Zealand-European free trade agreement.

He described the agreement as a "bloody good deal" that had involved several years of tough negotiations.

The European Parliament subsequently ratified the NZ-EU free trade agreement on 23 November 2023.

During the 2023 New Zealand general election, O'Connor was unseated by National MP Maureen Pugh, who won the West Coast-Tasman by a margin of 1,017 votes.

Despite losing his seat, O'Connor was re-elected to Parliament on the Labour Party list.

In mid November 2023, O'Connor represented New Zealand at the 2023 APEC summit since incoming Prime Minister Christopher Luxon was unable to attend due to ongoing coalition-forming negotiations with the ACT and New Zealand First parties.

When the Labour Party formed a coalition government with New Zealand First in 2017, O'Connor was appointed Minister of Agriculture, Minister for Biosecurity, Minister for Food Safety, Minister for Rural Communities and Associate Minister (later Minister of State) for Trade and Export Growth.

An early challenge for O'Connor in the Agriculture portfolio was managing the 2017 Mycoplasma bovis outbreak, opting to attempt eradication to save the projected $1.3 billion cost in lost production to the industry over 10 years, with ongoing productivity losses across the farming sector.

On Agriculture, O'Connor has said there is a new “collective wisdom through generational change in farming, which means we are more closely aligned than some on the fringes wish to portray’’.

Later, he said in 2018 that this had set his career back.

During the 2020 general election, O'Connor was re-elected in West Coast-Tasman by a final margin of 6,208 votes, defeating National's candidate Maureen Pugh.

In early November 2020, O'Connor maintained his Agriculture, Biosecurity, and Rural Communities ministerial portfolios while becoming the lead Minister for Trade and Export Growth and assuming the Land Information ministerial portfolio.

In late January 2021, O'Connor drew media attention when he stated during an interview with CNBC's Asia Squawk Box "Australia "should follow us [New Zealand] and show respect to China." His comments came at a time of heightened Australian-China tensions relating to Australian legislation targeting foreign investment and Chinese trade sanctions against Australia. O'Connor's remarks were criticised as unhelpful to Australia and "at odds with reality" by Liberal MP Dave Sharma. While the Chinese state-owned newspaper Global Times praised Wellington's perceived openness towards Beijing, O'Connor's remarks were criticised by Victoria University of Wellington academic Robert Ayson, International Service for Human Rights director Phil Lynch and Human Rights Watch director Elaine Person for implying that New Zealand was prioritising trade with China over human rights.

Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, O'Connor has since said it is important New Zealand does not send ministers to the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic Games, stating "we've been very strong on those issues around human rights and unnecessary discrimination. We should continue to do that."

O'Connor has led various trade negotiations across the world in his role as Minister for Trade and Export Growth, including an historic $1.8 Billion EU Free Trade Agreement in 2022.