Last night's Portage constituency candidate's debate at Eagles Fire Youth Centre's well received by those who attended. The debate featured two of three candidates, Liberal Stephen Prince, and Progressive Conservative Ian Wishart. The NDP's Alex MacDonald was not in attendance. Kevin Way was one of those who attended the debate, and says while he was impressed with the present candidates, the third candidate's absence was noticed.

"There were good responses and an awful lot of good questions. There was nothing mentioned about the flood, which I'm sure they're tired of hearing about. The only thing I do have to say is it's unfortunate the NDP could not attend tonight, or chose not to. I think someone who's trying to run and maintain the government in power should have been here, but I guess that was their choice."

Anne Street was also impressed with the candidates' performance. She notes it was particularly interesting to see first-time contender Prince going up against Wishart, who's running for his second term. 

Anne Street (left)

"Both candidates were well-organized and very articulate. I give credit to Stephen Prince for running for the Liberal Party, being a first-time candidate running against our Conservative Ian Wishart, who has more experience in that. They both did very, very well."

Last night's debate saw a full house, with many commenting on just how many youth attended the event.