Fresh debate format serves voters well, thanks to Paul Wells

The biggest problem was that it was staged so long before the election

“The parties have agreed that at any point I can intervene to direct the conversation.” With that, moderator Paul Wells kicked off the first leadership debate of the 2015 election campaign. And Wells did intervene — often, in fact — to the benefit of viewers. The result was a lively, interesting and revealing discussion that was an improvement over televised debates in recent years.

Political debates are often artificial constructs. Notionally, the moderator asks a question, one candidate answers it and then the others jump in and challenge each other on the topic. In practice, however, in most debates all the candidates resort to talking points and rarely is the initial question answered.

But the format employed by Maclean’s was refreshing. Because Wells asked followup questions — sometimes several in a row — and jumped into the discussion strategically, the debate stayed on track more than many other past versions. The leaders still strayed from the prescribed topics at times. A glaring example: a question about coalitions and our voting system yielded an exchange between Justin Trudeau and Tom Mulcair on a future referendum in Quebec. It was one of the liveliest exchanges of the night but it was about an issue that is unlikely to present itself during the next Parliament.

Wells could have intervened in one or two places when the leaders were talking over each other, but otherwise he used his power effectively and judiciously. And for the most part, viewers were given a good opportunity to judge the leaders’ platforms and their comportment. Ultimately, whether we are superficial or simply looking for visual clues about authenticity and integrity, these programs are as much about how the leaders appear rather than what they say: how comfortable they look in their own skin and whether you can picture them as prime minister.

For that reason, I expect the NDP will not be happy with how Mulcair was framed by the cameras. While Trudeau and Stephen Harper were able to address viewers square to the camera, Mulcair was mostly depicted from an angle and it contributed to the impression that he was awkward; he even looked a little off-balance. It was important for Mulcair to look like a prime minister and the camera angle didn’t help.

At times the program made too much of an effort to showcase Maclean’s itself: lots of images of magazine covers and articles were displayed during the prerecorded opening to each segment. Because past debates have been organized by a consortium of competing television networks, there typically has been a complete absence of media branding.

And I didn’t find the frequent breaks — another innovation — particularly constructive. For one thing, they were very rushed. Producers tried to cram several different segments into each three-minute break and the result was an unsustainable pace and little meaningful content. At one point, a host asked a question of a guest and then interrupted him a few seconds later saying they were out of time.

In the age of social media, reactions are shared in real time, but my personal preference would be to observe the entire debate before having pundits weigh in on winners and losers. Showing how people were reacting on Facebook was also a bit fruitless. Facebook users are a specific subset of Canadians, not an accurate sample of the entire voting population, so it was hard to rely on the results as indicative of any new trend. Is it believable, for example, that Stephen Harper is only 1 per cent ahead of Elizabeth May?

Ultimately, though, the fresh format and the experience and knowledge of Wells contributed to a useful and entertaining debate that served voters well. The Maclean’s debate was better than what we’ve seen in the past few elections. It’s just a shame it was on a summer night long before the election. Let’s hope this isn’t the last time we see the leaders in this type of open, wide-ranging and multi-faceted exchange before October arrives.