Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo candidate profile: Wayne Allan, independent.

This week, Castanet Kamloops is going to help you get to know the seven candidates looking to represent the Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo riding in Ottawa. We will be posting a video and a Q&A for each of the seven local hopefuls running in the Sept. 20 federal election. Each candidate is asked the same questions and their answers are published in full.

Here is the lineup for this week's special election coverage: Monday: Bill Sundhu, NDP; Tuesday: Bob O'Brien, independent; Wednesday: Jesse Mccormick, Liberal; Thursday: Corally Delwo, People's Party of Canada; Friday: Iain Currie, Green; Saturday: Frank Caputo, Conservative; and Sunday: Wayne Allan, independent.

Who are you and why do you want to be MP? Tell us about yourself — where are you from, what do you do and what will you bring to the table?

Wayne Allan: “Well, my name is Wayne Allen. I was born in this province. My family history goes way back before Confederation. You know, my ancestors go back over 4,000 years because I am, after 61 years of denial, I've been given my my rightful status back.

“I realized that Canada is in distress. The people are in distress, and they're uncertain as to which way to turn because they no longer trust government. And we need to change, it's time to change, to do away with this representative democracy that has been making people of Canada nothing but serviceable ever since the Second World War. And we need to change that, we need to start building for the people of Canada, and we need to start building Canada rather than running around in different countries, trying to spread goodwill and it does nothing for us, it does nothing for our future.

“So that's why I'm here. I'm trying to make a difference. And I'm trying to promote direct democracy and the independent candidate.”

What experience do you have that makes you qualified to represent this riding in Ottawa?

Allan: “Well, if you're looking for certificates hanging on the wall, you wont see them. I'm a working person, I've worked my way up from the very beginning, and I've done very well. I've been recognized by big corporations like Wellwood.

“I've gone on to do different things where I've become their project manager or coordinator for different jobs. Whether I was making adobe in Arizona, building a commercial building, doing commercial electrical work, or tearing down sawmills, which I've done throughout this province throughout the years. I've owned my own businesses. My character, and my work has always followed me wherever I've gone.”

What local issues do you think you would be able to tackle as MP?

Allan: “Well, I would like to bring industry to Kamloops. I would like to be able to talk with Viking Air in Victoria, I would like to be able to talk with Bombardier, and I would like us to see if we can get a factory going in British Columbia, a factory where we can make, produce CL-515 water bombers, CL-415 the old style water bombers, so that we can produce squadrons of bombers so that we are at the readiness to prevent forest fires from ever getting out of control again, so that we can be on the scene in within minutes. That is my main concern right now, as our weathers is becoming more and more challenging, and it will continue to get worse, and we need to be prepared. We need to prepare ourselves, from forest fires, we need to prepare ourselves from the heat, we need to adjust our sustainable energy policies and promote good building policies. Policies that are going to protect people in the future, and it's not just about money, and profits.”

What are your thoughts on vaccine passports, as introduced by the B.C. government on Monday?

Allan: “I think what the government is doing is totally wrong. I'm totally against it because it goes against our freewill and everything we stand for as citizens. We cannot allow government to treat us like children anymore. You know, they are not our babysitter's, we are grown adults, and we have the knowledge and the intellect to make decisions on our own without government interference.

“In other words, we have the right to individual freedom and individual choice, and that's what I stand for. So I'm against this vaccine policy.”

Are you double vaccinated for COVID-19? If not, why not?

Allan: “I’m not. I am not for the simple reason that — and I think a lot of people in Canada think so too — for the simple reason that we no longer trust our government. We no longer have confidence in our health care system, as long as it is representative by big government.

“For me, this is deja vu, my great, great grandmother was a Nootka Sound princess, and she left Nootka Sound in 1860 to come to the Interior, and it was wasn't till after 1862 when smallpox ravaged the northern west coast of British Columbia, Vancouver Island and British Columbia, and she got the call to come back to be the hereditary chief of her tribe that was pretty much destroyed.

“So how do you expect me to put my beliefs in something like that? Smallpox came here in doses, but what people don't realize this is the vaccine was available in 1797. Why didn't they use it? Why didn't Truman use it during the Indian Wars? He vaccinated his troops. I just, I have no trust in this present government and it's time to change.”

What do you think needs to be done to combat the social issues plaguing Kamloops streets and, if elected, what would you do about it?

Allan: “First of all, what's happening in Kamloops should have never happened and it never should have happened anywhere, Victoria, anywhere in the province of British Columbia. Our governments are responsible for the people and to see homelessness is just an outrage. Everyone should have the opportunity to have a home even if they don't have the money. We can build small homes to accommodate people. We should be building greenhouses around this, around our cities in Kamloops and in the interior. We can put these people in these little communities and make them productive so that they are giving back to society. And so that they have place that they can belong. That's what we need.

“We need planning, we need to work together. We just can't put people in a category, 'oh those people here they're no good, they're outcasts, get rid of them.' Why are we seeing welfare kids, orphans that have been put into the system? Why are we seeing them coming out of the system and going right into the street? What does that tell us? You know, our social structure needs a good mending, and if we don't do it, these people will go stray. We will lose them if we haven't already, and we are doing the same thing with our children with internet, we are losing our grasp on our children, and it needs to come to me and we need to get our families back in order. And we need to get our country back in order.”

What are your thoughts on climate change in general?

Allan: “I believe this government has deceived us in every way possible when it comes to climate change. Trudeau was telling us that it's the people that are killing this earth. And, you know, of course, you know, I've been concerned about this for quite some time now, actually years, as our population climbed to 8 billion people, and we have a capacity of not more than 10.

“We've already reached that limit. But it's more than that, what the government is not telling people, is for all those years that they detonated over 2100 nuclear warheads in the ocean and under our ground, and how many people know about Operation Fishbowl and Starfish Prime, when they detonated that nuclear warheads into our atmosphere which created afterwards, five bands of radiation, which I believe broke down our ozone layer and attacked our magnetic field, which holds everything in place and this government and the other governments are not being truthful about this.

“They are a mirror imaging us, blaming us for something they created. I think it's time that they stand up and admit that they poke the lion and belly too many times and now we're paying the price.”

The Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo riding area is routinely impacted by wildfire. If elected, would you endeavour to take any steps to prevent or better fight wildfires? If yes, what would they be?

Allan: “I’m not pointing my finger at the local BC forestry services, I believe that they are under the gun from up above, and they're just doing their job and doing what they're told. I believe if they had the opportunity, they would make changes. We need to be establishing a protocol where we are cutting, eliminating any hazards within the city, and doing the same out in our forests, we need to actually be cutting, making proper cuts that allow us to get in there and fight a forest fire.

“We shouldn't be going in and scraping up fire lines after the fact, they should have all been done, and set it into motion before that, we have definite fire breaks in our forests, and that the valleys around us are protected. The same applies, to our highways and homes. With climate change the way it is, why are we allowing and continue to allow trees to overgrow right up to the highways and right into the cities and we do nothing to stop it.

“It's our responsibility to take action and make sure that we are protected, and our homes are protected, and our land is protected. It is our responsibility to make this happen.”

If elected, what would your first priority be for the riding?

Allan: “It has to be a water-bomber factory. We need a factory. We need to start producing water-bombers, because nobody else is. I mean, look what happened last summer, who stepped up and when they did step up, I believe they sent a giant helicopter packing back down south to the United States.

“Our big, giant plane, I forget what they call it, it's a big, it's a huge water-bomber. But they just left that sitting and I realize it's the old It costs about $10,000 an hour to operate, but at this point, we should had the military up in the air with huge water bags dumping water out of the back of FC-131s just to get something going.

“This fire hasn't been really fought from the air. It's been the people that got up and protected their homes and did what was necessary to beat this fire back.”