The growing number of Progressive Conservative candidates declining to participate in local debates is raising questions about whether the party is muzzling inexperienced and controversial members in a top-down attempt to control the campaign message.

More than 20 PC candidates have skipped debates since the beginning of the provincial election campaign, a trend that recalls similar absenteeism among federal Conservative candidates under Stephen Harper. Candidates from other Ontario parties, meanwhile, have been far more likely to show up.

Critics say it’s a tactic meant to keep the focus on PC Leader Doug Ford.

“It implies that the only person you need to hear from is the leader and everybody else is just a potted plant and you put your “X” beside Ford and everything else will be fine,” said Robin Sears, a former NDP strategist of 20 years, now a principal at Earnscliffe Strategy Group.

This is not how our parliamentary democracy is supposed to work, says Duff Conacher, director of Democracy Watch. “Any campaign that tries to control access and control the message is a campaign that is hurting the voters’ right to choose the person they really want to represent them,” he said.

Meredith Cartwright, the Toronto Centre candidate who hired actors to pose as Ford supporters at a leadership debate, was a no-show at an all-candidates’ meeting in Corktown on Tuesday that was attended by the Liberal, NDP and Green party candidates and at a meeting on Wednesday that was attended only by the NDP and Green candidates. She has not spoken publicly since the crowd-for-hire controversy erupted.

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Spadina—Fort York PC candidate Iris Yu cancelled an appearance on Tuesday at a debate organized by the York Quay Neighbourhood Association that was attended by the Liberal, NDP and Green candidates. She did not attend all-candidates meetings on Wednesday and Thursday.

PC candidates skipped four separate debates held this week in Scarborough, including Gary Ellis in Scarborough Southwest, who claimed a long-standing prior commitment; Sarah Mallo in East York; Christine Hogarth in Etobicoke-Lakeshore and Vijay Thanigasalam in Scarborough Rouge-Park, who cancelled the day of the event, according to an organizer.

Four out of five PC candidates did not participate in public debates held by the Brampton Board of Trade on May 11, and three of them cancelled on the same day.

Harjit Jaswal, running in Brampton Centre, and Simmer Sandhu, running in Brampton East, both cancelled the day before the debates were scheduled to take place, after previously accepting. (On Wednesday, Sandhu announced he was dropping out of the race.)

Amarjot Sandhu in Brampton West let organizers know late in the afternoon the day before the debates that he would not be attending.

Brampton North PC candidate Ripudaman Dhillon did not confirm, decline or attend.

The independent, non-profit newsroom pressprogress.ca has pulled together a list of 23 PC candidates who have been missing in action at meetings.

Sears and others trace the tactic back to Harper’s Conservatives in the 2008 federal election. The issue of Conservative candidates not showing up for debates was also raised in the 2011 Ontario election and the 2015 federal election when it was alleged that Conservatives were instructed by the party not to participate in debates or engage with the media.

“I think there is certainly a sense in elections over the last decade that the Conservatives don’t want their candidates exposed in debates,” said Tim Grant, a candidate for the Green party, who has run twice in the downtown riding of Trinity Spadina and is now running in the newly created University-Rosedale riding.

“One can only speculate that particularly with the kind of volatile leader like Doug Ford, that they are wanting to protect the leader by not having candidates say things in the local debate that cause him to be approached by reporters, with one gaffe or another, and then he loses his speaking points.”

Asked whether PC party headquarters has told any candidates not to take part in public debates, Ford spokesperson Melissa Lantsman declined to confirm or deny.

“We work with candidates to ensure they are effective in their voter outreach, be it phone calls, door knocking or debates,” she said.

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She included a list of 21 PC candidates who have participated in debates or are planning to and pointed to meetings in April in Peel that were better attended by PC candidates than by candidates from other parties.

The PC candidates did not respond to requests from the Star for comment, except for Amarjot Sandhu’s campaign manager, Graham McGregor.

“Amarjot is focused on knocking on doors and meeting as many constituents as possible to hear directly from them about the challenges they face in Ontario today. Due to previous commitment and short notice, unfortunately Amarjot was unable to attend,” McGregor wrote in an e-mail.

Keeping candidates away from debates can be strategic, according to a political veteran who worked closely with Harper.

“There is a strain of thinking that subscribes to the belief that debates tend to happen in rooms filled with people who are already decided, and that door-knocking is a better use of time for candidates to persuade and surface votes,” said Andrew MacDougall, a former director of communications for Harper.

Typically, candidates are inundated with requests to debate local issues during an election campaign and find it hard to attend all of them. Sean Conway, the NDP candidate for Peterborough-Kawartha, has been invited to 17 all-candidates events or debates to date.

“I plan to attend as many as I can — so far I’ve committed to attending 14 of them,” Conway said. “I think participating in conversations is really important.”

Jo-Ann Davis, the Liberal candidate for University-Rosedale, said she attends every candidates meeting she can.

“For me, attending debates is just one way to be able to listen to residents, hear their concerns, answer their questions, so they can understand where I stand on their important issues. I like those two-way dialogues,” Davis said.

The Green party’s Grant calls candidate debates “a good leveller.”

“It’s one thing to get a flyer that has been edited and smoothly written and actually have candidates put on the spot with issues — and they are always topical issues — that are raised in debates. So really, it’s a good leveller and it allows people to get beyond the spin and it gets you into the nittygritty of policies that are important to them, to communities,” Grant said.

Gary Pieters, president of CityPlace Residents’ Association, says voters want to make sure candidates understand local issues.

“Sometimes the leaders can overshadow the local candidates. In our case, we want to ensure that our candidates are looking at our communities and their unique needs.”

Candidate debates are an important part of the democratic process, according to Duff Conacher at Democracy Watch.

“If someone is practiced, they can say a bunch of lines for one month and get away with it. But when you are live and debating your opponents, then if it’s all a façade, there is more likelihood the façade will be stripped away and people will have a chance to see who the person really is.

“Public access and the public’s ability to see candidates in person and how they react to being challenged is important.”

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