The Leaders’ Debates Commission has made a last minute decision to cancel the media scrum that was to follow the English-language leaders debate.
Debate organizers have confirmed with True North that the Commission has decided to cancel the post-debate media scrum. No official reason has been given for the cancellation at this time.
The scrum is an opportunity for reporters with accredited media outlets to take turns questioning the federal leaders. Each leader was afforded a 10 minute time period to take questions from the media.
Following Wednesday’s French-language leaders debate, the scrum went on without incident, with independent media outlets and legacy media outlets receiving several questions.
Canadian mainstream media outlets were not shy in voicing their frustrations with independent media seizing the opportunity to ask questions of the major federal party leaders.
The media centre—a large auditorium in the Maison Radio-Canada building in Montreal’s CBC headquarters—was already tense before the media scrum being cancelled, with at least one journalist engaging in a loud outburst and another journalist being removed from the building entirely.
This is a developing story that will be updated as more information comes in.