For the second federal election in a row, the People's Party of Canada won't be represented on Cogeco's Your TV local election debate.
See: Bernier will join in national TV debate. Mark King looking for a change locally
And: The debate over debates. King shut out of local TV debate
That has the local candidate, Greg Galente crying foul.
"I'm not surprised, I'm disappointed," Galante told BayToday this morning.
A campaign news release said, "YourTV's decision is particularly galling in light of the Leaders' Debates Commission's exclusion of PPC leader Maxime Bernier from the nationally televised debates in both English and French."
“YourTV is just more mainstream media silencing voices they don't like,” said Galante. “If you're not parroting the usual pro-lockdown, vaccine-passport group-think they will just shut you down.”
Galante is also upset that the other candidates in the riding – Anthony Rota, Steven Trahan, and Scott Robertson, didn't stand up to Cogeco for his inclusion and demand that he be invited.
“Maybe they didn't know I was excluded. Or maybe they support the exclusion of the PPC and our message of freedom from government overreach.”
Joey Roussy, Manager, Programming & Community Relations locally told BayToday that "YourTV has a policy that if you have a seat when parliament was dissolved then you got invited to the debate, if you did not have a seat then you were provided with free airtime, the chance to do a video up to two minutes. They've sent in their video, but did not meet our criteria to be in the debate."
Roussy says there is no flexibility in the local debate.
"It's the same policy for all YourTV debates across Ontario."
Galante isn't buying that argument.
"I don't know how that translates down to the local level when there are only four of us running, and I'm kind of the only contrarian offering a different point of view." added Galante.
He's asking supporters to phone Cogeco and complain.
