Huron, and later Huron–Middlesex, was an electoral district in Midwestern Ontario, Canada formerly represented in Canada's House of Commons and in the provincial Legislative Assembly of Ontario. Throughout both its federal and provincial existence, the district had within it the majority of Huron county's population, with the county's major population centres such as Goderich, Seaforth (now part of Huron East), Clinton (now part of Central Huron), and Exeter (now part of South Huron) in the district at all time. In the early 1970s, portions of Middlesex County were added to both the federal and provincial district, leading to the name change to Huron–Middlesex at both levels.

Upon the elimination of the federal district in 1979 and of the provincial district in 1996, both saw their territories absorbed by districts named Huron–Bruce. The nature of their transitions were however different. A Huron—Bruce (federal electoral district) had not previously existed, and thus was a bona fide successor district of the Huron/Huron–Middlesex federal electoral district. The Huron—Bruce (provincial electoral district) in the other hand was created at the same time as the Huron provincial district and had co-existed with Huron for more than five of Huron's six-decade existence, each returning a member to the 19th to 33rd Ontario parliaments.

Members of Provincial Parliament

Huron–Middlesex

Huron

Evolution of geography Provincial The Huron provincial electoral district was created by the Representation Act, 1933. Huron Country saw its representation reduced previously in 1925 from three to two seats. The 1933 redistribution further reduced its representation to one and a half seats through the elimination of Huron South and Huron North and the creation of the new Huron and Huron—Bruce electoral districts. The 1933 act divides the communities in Huron county as follows: (grouped by modern day municipalities created in 2001 as noted in brackets, for ease of reference only) Huron: Goderich (now Goderich) Clinton and Hullett (now Central Huron) Hay, Stanley, Hensall (now Bluewater) Seaforth, McKillop, Tuckersmith (Huron East) Exeter, Stephen, Usborne (South Huron) Huron—Bruce: Ashfield, Colborne, Wawanosh West (Ashfield–Colborne–Wawanosh) Howick (Howick) Morris, Turnberry (Morris-Turnberry) Brussels, Grey (Huron East) Blyth, Wawanosh East, Wingham (North Huron) plus other communities in Bruce County

The distribution of communities remained the same following the redistribution in 1954. The redistribution of 1966 specifically named two additional communities, Zurich and Bayfield (both now in Bluewater) in Huron, that were not mentioned before, but made no real change to the geography of these electoral district.

The 1975 redistribution brought substantive changes to the electoral district, adding various community form Middlexsex County to the district while transferring McKillop and Hullett away to Huron—Bruce The communities assigned to the two district after 1975 were as follows: Huron-Middlesex Goderich Hay, Stanley, Hensall, Bayfield, Zurich (Bluewater) Exeter, Stephen, Usborne (South Huron) Seaforth, Tuckersmith (Huron East) Clinton (Central Huron) (Communities in Middlsex) McGillivray, East Williams, West Williams, Parkhill, Ailsa Craig (North Middlesex) Adelaide (Adelaide-Metcalfe) Lucan, Biddulph (Lucan-Biddulph) Huron-Bruce Ashfield, Colborne, Wawanosh West (Ashfield–Colborne–Wawanosh) Howick Morris, Turnberry (Morris-Turnberry) Brussels, Grey, (Huron East) Blyth, Wawanosh East, Wingham (North Huron) (Central Huron) plus other communities in Bruce County ()

In 1986, Huron's representation was further reduced to a single seat. The provincial district of Huron–Bruce was eliminated and the electoral district name was reverted back to Huron with the entire country assigned to it.

The provincial electoral district of Huron was tagged for elimination in 1996 with the enactment of the Fewer Politicians Act, 1996, which prescribed the adoption of federal electoral boundary in a subsequent election. The Huron riding was slated to merge with neighbouring Bruce, leading to the head-to-head nomination battle between two Progressive Conservative MPPs, Huron's Helen Johns and Bruce's Barbara Fisher, from which Johns emerged as the winner.

Federal The Huron federal electoral district had a relative shorter lifespan. It was created in 1952 by the federal Representation Act of 1952 with a vast majority of the Huron County, with only three communities being assigned to neighboring Wellington-Huron. Huron Goderich Hullett (Central Huron) Grey, McKillop, Tuckersmith (Huron East) Hay, Stanley (Bluewater) Stephen, Usborne (South Huron) Morris (Morris-Turnberry) Ashfield, Colborne, West Wawanosh (Ashfield–Colborne–Wawanosh) East Wawanosh (North Huron) (plus Hibbert in Perth County)

Wellington-Huron Howick Turnberry (Morris-Turnberry) Wingham (North Huron) plus other communities in Wellington County

In 1966, the electoral district ridded of its small piece in Perth, gained almost all remaining Huron communities from Wellington–Huron, plus three communities from Middlesex County: Ailsa Craig, Biddulph and McGillivray.

Similar to what would occur to its provincial counterpart a year later, the federal electoral district was renamed Huron–Middlesex in 1974. Unlike its counterpart however, it gain no new territory. It was simply a delayed renaming to properly reflect the communities it had incorporated eight years earlier. The federal district was only contested under the new name Huron–Middlesex once in 1974.

In the 1976 round of redistribution, the electoral district was to revert back to be just Huron and was slated to stay the course with only minor adjustments. The 1976 Representation Order that was proclaimed in 1976 had it trade the three Middlesex communities for Carrick, Culross, Huron and Kinloss from Bruce County.

In July 1977 however, the brief existence of the federal district came abruptly to an end. An act of parliament with only one section was enacted for the sole purpose of changing its name from Huron to Huron—Bruce. It was one however, as eleven other electoral districts met the same fate.

References

Sources Boundaries definitions:

Federal

Representation Order, 1966

Representation Order, 1976