In December 2015 the IRPP held a colloquium at Carleton University on the future of leaders’ debates in Canadian elections. Members of the Canadian media, representatives from the major federal political parties, and a number of academics participated in a series of discussions that tackled the issues regarding the format of leaders’ debates. In March the IRPP released its colloquium report, “The Future of Leaders’ Debates in Canadian Federal Elections,” which outlined the points of consensus and contention amongst the colloquium’s participants and analyzed the major themes of the discussion. Along with the release of the report, Policy Options published several articles on the topic.

We caught up with one of the report’s co-authors, Christopher Waddell, a professor at Carleton University’s School of Journalism and Communications, to get his take on the “debate about the debates.” To read the IRPP’s colloquium report, click here. To read the Policy Options articles on the topic, click here.