Peter Kormos
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Peter Kormos (born October 7, 1952 in Welland, Ontario) is a politician in Ontario, Canada. A former lawyer, he was first elected as an MPP to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as candidate of the New Democratic Party in the riding of Welland in a by-election in 1988, replacing veteran NDP legislator Mel Swart. Kormos has been re-elected in every Ontario general election since, and now represents the redistributed riding of Niagara Centre.
Kormos first attained notoriety in the Welland area while still in high school, while president of his student council. Kormos led a sit-in student strike against local administration practices. The strike brought school activities to a halt, resulting in Kormos's temporary expulsion. He was later educated at Niagara College, York University and Osgoode Hall in Toronto. Called to the bar in 1980, Kormos then worked as a barrister in the Niagara region.
The NDP won government under Bob Rae in the general election of 1990, and Kormos was appointed to cabinet as Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations and Minister of Financial Institutions on October 1, 1990. Notably, he was expected to implement a public auto insurance system, a longstanding cornerstone of Ontario NDP policy. Rae subsequently backed away from this goal, against considerable opposition from the outspoken Kormos and other party members, including Swart and Kormos' supporter and fellow MPP Mark Morrow.
Kormos additionally elicited controversy by appearing, fully clothed, as a "Sunshine Boy" model in the Toronto Sun tabloid. This was anathema to some in the party, because of the Sun's politically conservative position and because of the Sunshine Boy's place as a parallel to the "Sunshine Girl" franchise, pictures of scantily-clothed women given considerably more prominence than the Sunshine Boy. Kormos was dropped from cabinet on March 18, 1991. For remainder of Rae's term in office, Kormos acted as an unofficial "left opposition" within the NDP caucus, together with Morrow and, until his resignation, Anglican priest Dennis Drainville. In 1993, this group and former cabinet minister Karen Haslam were the only NDP MPPs to vote against the Rae government's Social Contract legislation.
The NDP were defeated in the 1995 provincial election, though Kormos's personal popularity was such that he was re-elected without difficulty.
After the retirement of Rae, Kormos sought the leadership of the Ontario NDP at the convention held on June 22, 1996. He placed third, behind Frances Lankin and Howard Hampton. He threw his support to Hampton, which played significantly in Hampton's victory.
Kormos represents socialist economic values with a populist, working-class presentation. He opposes the Third Way movement made famous by British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
He has recently been noted for his position that "government should get out of the marriage business," which some critics see as an equivocal stance designed to placate social conservatives opposed to same-sex marriage. Nevertheless, Kormos is generally regarded as an ally of the province's gay community, and has supported several bills expanding the range of same-sex benefits in the province.
Kormos was a political mentor to prominent Canadian actor Sarah Polley.