THUNDER BAY -- Every federal leader won the latest debate depending on who's asked.
The debate, held Thursday evening in Calgary, featured the three main party leaders with Green Party leader Elizabeth May, excluded from the night, taking to social media and gaining thousands of new followers as she tweeted.
NDP Thunder Bay-Superior North candidate Andrew Foulds said Tom Mulcair was the clear winner.
"I think that he was calm, he was measured and he presented to Canadians a bold long-term vision," Foulds said.
Stephen Harper took the night according to Conservative Thunder Bay-Rainy River candidate Moe Comuzzi saying that the other two leaders looked like they were auditioning to lead the opposition.
"The Prime Minister spent half his night looking at Justin and Thomas Mulcair fighting so he showed us he is the only choice," she said.
Her Liberal rival Don Rusnak though said Trudeau was the only one willing to tell the truth on the economy, pushing for deficits in order to pay for infrastructure projects, rather than selling "smoke-and-mirrors" by promising balanced budgets.
"And it showed. They're planning balanced budgets at the expense of costs to Canadians," he said.
For Thunder Bay-Superior North incumbent Green Bruce Hyer, the whole thing showed that Canadian politicians need to work together.
"Last night we had three angry men yelling at each other and the voice of reason was far far away," he said alluding to May responding to the debate via social media.
While the economy and job creation was top of mind during the debate, the Ring of Fire, an important potential economic driver for the region and country, wasn't mentioned.
Foulds said the party has a framework that will help resource development for the entire country. While those industries will always be Canada's backbone, the federal government needs to shift its focus. Mulcair jabbed Thursday night that Harper had put all of his eggs in the resource economy basket and then dropped it.
"That is a mistake. We need to diversify our economy," Foulds said.
Comuzzi said she's not surprised the Ring of Fire wasn't brought up but the region needs to take any opportunity it can to grow.
"I think anything that we can bring to Thunder Bay-Rainy River that creates jobs is good news," she said.
Borrowing money while it's cheap and helping stimulate the economy while helping cities and provinces tackle infrastructure deficits at the same time is the way to go right now Rusnak said. That can also help with projects like the Ring of Fire. That project though needs to be done right, hand-in-hand with First Nations.
"We need to open it up but responsibly," Rusnak said.
