CHCH

The broadcast consortium that organizes the federal leader’s debate says Green Party leader Elizabeth May shouldn’t take part in the televised leaders debate since the Green Party does not have an MP in the House of Commons. However, the owners of this web site have offered an alternative.

If the broadcast consortium will not allow May to participate, Hamilton’s CHCH-TV will.

Channel Zero — the owners of CHCH and this website — issued a statement saying:

“Clearly, this type of behaviour illustrates one of the real dangers of media ownership concentration that we have witnessed recently in Canada. Democracy demands that the media simply relay parties positions without attempting to control the message. Excluding the leader of a party that garnered 1 out of every 15 votes in the 2008 federal election is just plain wrong”.

Those words were from Channel Zero’s President and CEO Cal Millar, who goes on to say the company is offended by the actions of the broadcast consortium to shut out Elizabeth May.

Therefore, CHCH-TV is inviting the Green Party leader along with Stephen Harper, Michael Ignatieff, Jack Layton and Gilles Duceppe to take part in a televised debate at CHCH’s Hamilton, Ontario studios.

That debate would air on CHCH, on the sister station in Montreal, Metro 14, and on CHEK in the Vancouver area, as well as any other broadcaster who wishes to air it.