Patrick Allard does renovations in Winnipeg, but he believes the entire country needs an overhaul..The entrepreneur and activist has lost count of how many tickets he received during the pandemic for having protests and defying COVID-19 health orders. He said they’re “all toilet paper” for their illegitimacy..“Our very first protest was May 9 of 2020. My first ticket was November 2020 in front of City Hall. They had police officers on all the rooftops taking pictures with the long lenses,” Allard recalled for the Western Standard in an interview..“I was ticketed 14 or 16 times and arrested twice. The first time was for breaching COVID health orders. The second time was breaching those bail conditions, allegedly.”.Allard’s bail conditions forbade him from calling for demonstrations that defied public health orders, He thought he was still in bounds for a post he made about the Winnipeg Blue Bombers after they refused to allow the unvaccinated to their football games. .“Once the all-supreme leader Brent Roussin, our chief officer of health, allowed for [outdoor gatherings of] 150 people, I made a Facebook post [saying] let's go block the road to the Bomber stadium because they're playing to a segregated crowd. It was a Facebook post to poke the bear. And it did,” Allard recalled..“The Major Crimes Unit came to my house and pulled me out of my hot tub in wet underwear and threw me against the wall because more people could show up. And I said, ‘Well, that's not really my problem. Maybe if they did show up and this is three weeks away, we might have an issue.’”.The charges for breach of bail conditions were stayed by the Crown. However, Allard has plenty of court dates left to go..“I was involved in a charter challenge with five others. We call ourselves the Manitoba Five, because there was five of us arrested: minister Tobias Thissen; Sharon Vickner, a friend of ours; Gerald Bohemier and Todd McDougall, who runs Winnipeg Alternative Media; and then myself,” Allard said..The charter challenge was dismissed, but has been appealed to the Court of King’s Bench. A separate challenge regarding masks will be heard August 30. Allard said he initially had representation from the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms, but later went with a Winnipeg lawyer..“I went with a local guy who actually called me while I was in jail and said, ‘You don't know me, but I know you. I support what you're doing. I just want to make sure you're okay.’ He was my lawyer in the charter challenge, Kyle Morgan. Yeah, good guy, quiet guy, young lawyer, but he believes in it and I call him a friend now.”.Allard said Manitoba was full of contradictions during the pandemic. The Jets season ticket holder was irked when captain Blake Wheeler called on the premier to bring in mask mandates. After that, Allard’s kids needed to play hockey with masks on, though Wheeler and the Jets never did..In December 2020, clothes for two-year-olds could not be bought in-store because they were declared non-essential; yet 24-T clothes for toddlers 24 months old remained available. Regular rubber boots could be bought inside, but pink rubber boots could not because they were considered fashion items..“The Canadian Human Rights Museum was not letting you in unless you showed your vaccine passport. So they were discriminating,” Allard added..Allard posted a picture of his ticket for the museum on Facebook and attracted police attention for it..“I had that posted, I was gonna go. That day came and I said, ‘You know what, I ruffled feathers for now, I'm gonna leave that one alone.’ They had nine cop cars show up to the Human Rights Museum awaiting my attendance, which never happened. A friend of mine showed up and they wouldn't let him in.”.Allard shopped in stores that were friendly to unmasked people, but eventually received a ticket for shopping maskless at a local store. Enforcers wanted to ticket the store owner too, but Allard successfully argued against it..“I never wore a mask. My wife never wore a mask. My daughter was the only kid in her whole school of 600 that never wore a mask for two years. We have no medical exemption. We just have our voice, we respect yours,” Allard said..The North Winnipeg resident ran in the Fort Whyte provincial byelection March 22, 2022, but the NDP wanted him barred from debates. Allard’s 101 votes placed him ahead of the 55 votes for Green Party candidate Nicholas Geddert. However, he trailed far behind the 1,112 votes for NDP candidate Trudy Schroeder; 2,853 for Liberal Willard Reaves; and 3,050 for Progressive Conservative winner Obby Khan.
