The former Howard government minister Jocelyn Newman has died at the age of 80, after a long struggle with Alzheimer’s disease.
The Newman family said she died peacefully at Berry on the NSW south coast on Sunday morning.
Newman’s son, Campbell, was Liberal National party premier of Queensland from 2012-2015. Her husband, Kevin, was a minister in the Fraser government.
She entered federal parliament in 1986 and built a reputation as a tough-talking Tasmanian Liberal senator who managed to fight off uterine and breast cancer while serving as the family and community services minister in the Howard government between 1998 and 2001. Newman was also social security minister from 1996 to 1998.
Her family have described her as a “true feminist” because of her life as an army wife, mother, grandmother, lawyer, farmer, hotelier, community volunteer, senator and cabinet minister.
She was a passionate campaigner for defence veterans and their families. The Tasmanian senator Eric Abetz said she was one of the “great female trailblazers in our democracy”.
Malcolm Turnbull said her contribution to the Senate, to Tasmania, to the Liberal party and to Australia was “by all measures, considerable and enduring”.
Born in 1937, she was one of a handful of women to study law at the University of Melbourne in the 1950s and her law practice included family law in the years before Gough Whitlam introduced the Family Law Act of 1975.
“This exposed her to the plight of women and children suffering from poverty and domestic violence – a harsh reality she would never forget – and it informed her commitment to the establishment of the Launceston Women’s Shelter,” her family said in a statement.
In 1975 she applied unsuccessfully for the post of women’s adviser to Whitlam, despite holding different political views to Whitlam: “It wasn’t party political for me, it was simply doing something for women,” she said.
Newman campaigned against structural inequalities faced by women, such as the lack of childcare facilities for young families, and the lack of a Medicare rebate for breast screening.
According to federal parliament’s biography of Newman, her views on the status of women were linked to her belief in the importance of personal responsibility, and she believed in “equal opportunity rather than affirmative action”.
She opposed legal recognition for same-sex couples, and believed women in the defence forces should not participate in combat roles. But she was a firm and consistent supporter of women’s right to abortion.
Abetz said he was saddened by Newman’s death and it said was a “true honour and privilege” to serve alongside her.
“My thoughts are with her children Campbell and Kate along with her family and the many Tasmanians who she touched throughout her life,” Abetz said.
In 2005, when Newman was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia, she said her top achievement was her 38-year marriage to Kevin.
Newman is survived by her son, Campbell, and daughter, Kate, and her granddaughters Rebecca, Sarah, Emma and Samantha.
There will be a memorial service in Canberra in the next fortnight.
Australian Associated Press contributed to this report
