Niagara Centre (renamed to Welland from 2006 to 2018) is a provincial electoral district in Ontario, Canada, represented from 1867 until 1977 and again since 2007 (under different boundaries) in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. Its population in 2006 was 112,875.

A new riding of Niagara Centre was created before the 1999 election from small parts of the Lincoln and St. Catharines—Brock ridings, and almost all of the Welland—Thorold riding. The current electoral district was created in 2003: 74.9% of the riding came from Niagara Centre riding, 22.5% from Erie—Lincoln and 2.7% from Niagara Falls riding. The name was changed to Welland during redistricting in 2006. In 2018, the name was changed back to Niagara Centre.

Geography

From 1967 to 1975, the southern part of the riding was covered by the Welland South district.

The pre-2018 Welland riding consisted of the cities of Welland, Thorold, Port Colborne, and the part of the City of St. Catharines lying south of a line drawn from the western city limit east along St. Paul Street West, northeast along St. Paul Crescent, east and south along Twelve Mile Creek, and east along Glendale Avenue to the eastern city limit.^[1]

Members of Provincial Parliament

Assembly	Years		Party
Welland
1st	1867–1871	William Beatty	Liberal
2nd	1871–1874	James Currie
3rd	1875–1879	James Currie
4th	1879–1883	Daniel Near
5th	1883–1886	James E. Morin
6th	1886–1890	James E. Morin
7th	1890–1894	William McCleary	Conservative
8th	1894–1898	William Manley German	Liberal
9th	1898–1900	William Manley German
9th	1900–1902	John Franklin Gross
10th	1902–1904	John Franklin Gross
11th	1905–1908	Evan Eugene Fraser	Conservative
12th	1908–1911
13th	1911–1914
14th	1914–1919	Donald Sharpe
15th	1919–1923	Robert Cooper	Liberal
16th	1923–1926	Marshall Vaughan	Conservative
17th	1926–1929
18th	1929–1934
19th	1934–1937	Edward James Anderson	Liberal
20th	1937–1943	Edward James Anderson	Liberal
21st	1943–1945	Howard Elis Brown	Co-operative Commonwealth
22nd	1945–1948	Thomas Henry Lewis	Progressive Conservative
23rd	1948–1951	Harold William Walker	Liberal
24th	1951–1955	Ellis Morningstar	Progressive Conservative
25th	1955–1959
26th	1959–1963
27th	1963–1967
28th	1967–1971
29th	1971–1975
30th	1975–1977	Mel Swart	New Democratic
Welland—Thorold
31st	1977–1981	Mel Swart	New Democratic
32nd	1981–1985
33rd	1985–1987
34th	1987–1988
34th	1988–1990	Peter Kormos
35th	1990–1995
36th	1995–1999
Niagara Centre Created from Welland—Thorold, Lincoln and St. Catharines—Brock
37th	1999–2003	Peter Kormos	New Democratic
38th	2003–2007	Peter Kormos	New Democratic
Welland
39th	2007–2011	Peter Kormos	New Democratic
40th	2011–2014	Cindy Forster
41st	2014–2018	Cindy Forster
Niagara Centre
42nd	2018–2022	Jeff Burch	New Democratic
43rd	2022–present		New Democratic

Source: Legislative Assembly of Ontario^[2]^[3]^[4]^[5]^[6]^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10]^[11]^[12]^[13]^[14]^[15]^[16]^[17]^[18]^[19]^[20]^[21]

Election results

Niagara Centre, 2018–

2022 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	New Democratic	Jeff Burch	16,360	39.70	−4.53
	Progressive Conservative	Fred Davies	15,506	37.64	+0.13
	Liberal	Terry Flynn	5,492	13.33	+1.51
	Green	Michelle McArthur	1,865	4.52	+0.83
	New Blue	Gary Dumelie	1,148	2.78
	Ontario Party	Vincent Gircys	837	2.03
Total valid votes			41,208	99.53	+0.90
Total rejected, unmarked and declined ballots			194	0.47	−0.90
Turnout			41,402	43.33	−12.80
Eligible voters			95,540
	New Democratic hold		Swing
Source: Elections Ontario^[22]

2018 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	New Democratic	Jeff Burch	21,618	44.23	−3.65
	Progressive Conservative	April Jeffs	18,333	37.51	+10.87
	Liberal	Benoit Mercier	5,779	11.82	−8.60
	Green	Joe Dias	1,803	3.69	−0.34
	None of the Above	Joe Crawford	623	1.27
	Libertarian	Patrick Pietruszko	368	0.75	−0.27
	Independent	Steve Soos	217	0.44
	People's Political Party	Dario Smagata-Bryan	133	0.27
Total valid votes			48,874	98.63
Total rejected, unmarked and declined ballots			680	1.37
Turnout			49,554	56.13
Eligible voters			88,287
	New Democratic hold		Swing		−7.26
Source: Elections Ontario^[23]

2014 general election redistributed results^[24]
Party		Vote	%
	New Democratic	20,334	47.88
	Progressive Conservative	11,313	26.64
	Liberal	8,674	20.42
	Green	1,713	4.03
	Libertarian	435	1.02

Welland, 2007–2018

2014 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	New Democratic	Cindy Forster	21,326	46.79	+2.06
	Progressive Conservative	Frank Campion	12,933	28.37	−3.71
	Liberal	Benoit Mercier	9,060	19.88	−0.01
	Green	Donna Cridland	1,803	3.96	+1.81
	Libertarian	Andrea J. Murik	460	1.01	−0.16
Total valid votes			45,582	100.0
	New Democratic hold		Swing		+2.88
Source: Elections Ontario^[25]

2011 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	New Democratic	Cindy Forster	19,527	44.66	−9.28
	Progressive Conservative	Domenic Ursini	14,048	32.13	+13.25
	Liberal	Benoit Mercier	8,638	19.76	−3.15
	Green	Donna Cridland	1,005	2.30	−1.94
	Libertarian	Donna-Lynne Hamilton	505	1.15
Total valid votes			43,723	100.00
Total rejected, unmarked and declined ballots			248	0.56
Turnout			43,971	51.64
Eligible voters			85,141
	New Democratic hold		Swing		−11.27
Source: Elections Ontario^[26]

2007 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%
	New Democratic	Peter Kormos	24,910	53.94
	Liberal	John Mastroianni	10,580	22.91
	Progressive Conservative	Ron Bodner	8,722	18.88
	Green	Mark Grenier	1,973	4.27
Total valid votes			46,185	100.0
Total rejected, unmarked and declined ballots			347	0.75
Turnout			46,532	55.29
Eligible voters			84,161
Source: Elections Ontario^[27]^[28]

Niagara Centre, 1999–2007

2003 Ontario general election
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	New Democratic	Peter Kormos	23,289	49.64	+5.21
	Liberal	Henry D'Angela	12,526	26.7	+7.31
	Progressive Conservative	Ann D. Gronski	10,336	22.03	−12.97
	Green	Jordan McArthur	768	1.64
Source: Elections Ontario^[29]

1999 Ontario general election
Party	Candidate	Votes	%
	New Democratic	Peter Kormos	21,856	44.43
	Progressive Conservative	Frank Sheehan	17,217	35
	Liberal	Maurice Charbonneau	9,539	19.39
	Natural Law	Margaret Larrass	382	0.78
	Independent	Lank Makuloluwa	198	0.4
Source: Elections Ontario^[29]

2007 electoral reform referendum

2007 Ontario electoral reform referendum
Side		Votes	%
	First Past the Post	26,925	60.1
	Mixed member proportional	17,859	39.9
	Total valid votes	44,784	100.0

References

External links

Provincial ridings in Hamilton, Halton and Niagara

Provincial ridings in Hamilton, Halton and Niagara
New Democratic	Hamilton Centre Hamilton Mountain Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas Niagara Centre Niagara Falls St. Catharines
Progressive Conservative	Burlington Flamborough—Glanbrook Hamilton East—Stoney Creek Milton Niagara West Oakville Oakville North—Burlington

Provincial ridings in Ontario

Provincial ridings in Ontario
Northern	Algoma—Manitoulin Kenora—Rainy River Kiiwetinoong Mushkegowuk—James Bay Nickel Belt Nipissing Parry Sound—Muskoka Sault Ste. Marie Sudbury Thunder Bay—Atikokan Thunder Bay—Superior North Timiskaming—Cochrane Timmins
Eastern	Bay of Quinte Glengarry—Prescott—Russell Hastings—Lennox and Addington Kingston and the Islands Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry
Central	Barrie—Innisfil Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound Dufferin—Caledon Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock Northumberland—Peterborough South Peterborough—Kawartha Simcoe—Grey Simcoe North York—Simcoe
Midwestern	Brantford—Brant Cambridge Guelph Haldimand—Norfolk Huron—Bruce Kitchener Centre Kitchener—Conestoga Kitchener South—Hespeler Oxford Perth—Wellington Waterloo Wellington—Halton Hills
Southwestern	Chatham-Kent—Leamington Elgin—Middlesex—London Essex Lambton—Kent—Middlesex London—Fanshawe London North Centre London West Sarnia—Lambton Windsor—Tecumseh Windsor West
Peel	Brampton Centre Brampton East Brampton North Brampton South Brampton West Mississauga Centre Mississauga East—Cooksville Mississauga—Erin Mills Mississauga—Lakeshore Mississauga—Malton Mississauga—Streetsville
Hamilton, Halton, and Niagara	Burlington Flamborough—Glanbrook Hamilton Centre Hamilton East—Stoney Creek Hamilton Mountain Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas Milton Niagara Centre Niagara Falls Niagara West Oakville North—Burlington Oakville St. Catharines
Ottawa	Carleton Kanata—Carleton Nepean Orléans Ottawa Centre Ottawa South Ottawa—Vanier Ottawa West—Nepean
Durham and York	Ajax Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill Durham King—Vaughan Markham—Stouffville Markham—Thornhill Markham—Unionville Newmarket—Aurora Oshawa Pickering—Uxbridge Richmond Hill Thornhill Vaughan—Woodbridge Whitby
Toronto	Beaches—East York Davenport Don Valley East Don Valley North Don Valley West Eglinton—Lawrence Etobicoke Centre Etobicoke—Lakeshore Etobicoke North Humber River—Black Creek Parkdale—High Park Scarborough—Agincourt Scarborough Centre Scarborough—Guildwood Scarborough North Scarborough—Rouge Park Scarborough Southwest Spadina—Fort York Toronto Centre Toronto—Danforth Toronto—St. Paul's University—Rosedale Willowdale York Centre York South—Weston
See also: Federal ridings in Ontario List of elections Politics of Ontario