TORONTO – Greens excluded from French and English tv-debates scheduled for tonight and tomorrow: the commission in charge of organizing the two debates between the leaders running in the federal election on April 28, has excluded the Green Party “for not meeting the participation requirements”. Here’s how it happened.

To be invited to the debates, parties must meet two of the following three criteria: have at least one sitting MP elected as a member of that party; have at least 4% support nationally in opinion polls; field candidates in at least 90% of all constituencies. The Greens initially announced that they would field candidates in all electoral districts. Then, the commission, earlier this month, invited the Greens to participate earlier this month, saying the party met both the benchmark for the number of candidates fielded and the number of MPs in the chamber.

Then, Greens co-leader Jonathan Pedneault (the other co-leader is Elizabeth May) told CBC on Tuesday that the party had withdrawn about 15 candidates from the race: a strategic decision to not run them in constituencies where the party believes the Conservatives are likely to win.

The commission said that deliberately reducing the number of candidates in the race for strategic reasons is inconsistent with the commission’s understanding of party vitality, which the third requirement (90%) was designed to measure. So, the commission said, including the Green leader in these circumstances would compromise the integrity of the debates and the interests of the voting public.

The commission also noted that the party had initially submitted a list of 343 names in March, but Elections Canada only lists 232 who have finalized their nominations and are running under the Green banner. So, even if we reconsider those fifteen candidates (and go back to 247), the party would still not have candidates in 96 of the 343 constituencies up for grabs.

In any case, it was the party’s own decision to exclude some candidates for strategic reasons that led to the decision to exclude the Greens from the debate: regardless of whether the Canadian Greens intended to nominate 343 people, in fact, a strategic decision was made to reduce the number of candidates, which means that voters no longer have the opportunity to vote for those candidates, in the view of the commission.

Green Party co-leader Jonathan Pedneault harshly criticized the commission’s decision, saying other parties are afraid of the Greens. “The commission is trying to… silence us!” Pedneault said during a campaign stop in Montreal. “Their last-minute decision to exclude the Green Party of Canada from the leadership debate is not only unfair and unfounded, because we met the criteria, but it’s also undemocratic. They’re afraid. They’re afraid of a clear voice calling for change and fighting for Canadians…”. Peadneault concluded by saying he expects to be present at the debate. “I expect the commission to reverse its decision, which is undemocratic…”.

According to some commentators, the last-minute-decision to remove Greens from the debates could favor the Conservatives and BLoc Quebecois in the French debate: the Liberal leader Mark Carney is not flawless in French language and, with one less leader in the debate, he will have to speak more. Pedneault himself made it clear that the pressure from the Conservatives and Quebecers would have weighed on the commission’s decision. And today Carney, commenting on the exclusion of the Greens, said: “Sorry that they will not be not there…”.

In the pic above: the co-leader of Greens, Jonathan Pedneault (from Twitter X – @j_pedneault)