Hon. Tom Mulcair was elected leader of the Official Opposition and Leader of Canada’s New Democrats on March 24th, 2012 with 57.2 % of the vote.
He was born in Ottawa, but was raised in Laval, North of Montreal. He is the second oldest of ten children.
A lawyer by trade, Tom Mulcair worked at the Legislative Affairs branch of the Justice Ministry, and later in the Legal Affairs Directorate of the Conseil de la langue française. At the end of 1987, Tom was named President of the Quebec Professions Board (Office des professions du Québec), a position he held until 1993.
He was first elected to Quebec National Assembly in 1994, as MNA for Chomedey. He was reelected three times. During his career in provincial politics, Tom Mulcair served as critic for Justice and for Industry, as well as Minister of Sustainable Development, Environment and Parks.
In 2007 Tom Mulcair accepted Jack Layton’s invitation to become his Quebec lieutenant. They were both convinced that the NDP represented the values of Quebec. Tom Mulcair went on to become the first NDP MP in the province of Quebec to be elected in a general election. He was first elected as the MP for Outremont in the 2007 by-election, and re-elected in 2008 and 2011.
Along with the strong NDP team, Jack Layton and Tom Mulcair worked tirelessly and helped to create a spectacular breakthrough in Quebec on May 2, 2011 – making Canada’s New Democrats the Official Opposition for the first time in history.
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