Howard George Hampton (born May 17, 1952) is a politician who was a member of Provincial Parliament for the province of Ontario. He served in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, Canada, from 1987 to 1999 in the electoral district of Rainy River, and from 1999 to 2011 in the redistributed electoral district of Kenora—Rainy River. A member of the Ontario New Democratic Party, he was also the party's leader from 1996 to 2009. Hampton retired from the legislature at the 2011 Ontario provincial election and subsequently joined Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP as a member of the law firm's corporate social responsibility and aboriginal affairs groups. His wife, Shelley Martel, was also an MPP until 2007, representing Nickel Belt. Early life, education, and early career Hampton was born in Fort Frances, Ontario to a blue collar family, George (April 17, 1928 - January 2, 2006) and Elsie (b. November 8, 1931) Hampton. He was a good student, but also athletically gifted and politically active. He first joined the NDP when he was a teenager. Hampton took an undergraduate degree in philosophy and religion from Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, where he played varsity hockey for the school's Division I NCAA ice hockey team. He later obtained a degree in education from the University of Toronto and a law degree from the University of Ottawa. He worked as a lawyer for the Canadian Labour Congress, and for the provincial NDP government of Allan Blakeney in Saskatchewan. Enters provincial politics Hampton sought election to the Ontario legislature under the NDP banner in the 1977 provincial election, placing third against incumbent Liberal Pat Reid and Progressive Conservative Gordon Armstrong in Rainy River. He ran for the riding again in the 1985 provincial election, and lost to Progressive Conservative candidate Jack Pierce by 278 votes. Cabinet minister Hampton was elected to Queen's Park on his third attempt, in the provincial election of 1987. He was re-elected in the 1990 provincial election, in which the NDP won a majority government. On October 1, 1990, he was appointed Attorney General in the government of Bob Rae. By all accounts, Hampton and Rae were not cabinet allies. Hampton disapproved of many of the Rae government's centrist policies; in particular, he opposed Rae's decision to retreat from an election pledge to introduce public automobile insurance in the province. Journalist Thomas Walkom has argued that Rae deliberately undermined Hampton's control