Sponsored Content
LANGFORD – Sean Flynn watched his father Charlie lead the biggest tax protest in Canadian history in Ontario in 1995, and it left a lasting impression.
Realizing how a grassroots movement could snap the government to attention inspired his life-long interest in politics, and is one reason why he has become the B.C. United candidate in the Langford-Highlands riding in this year’s provincial election.
“My father standing up against the government impressed me when I was younger,” he states, recalling the Fed Up movement when Paul Martin was Finance Minister. “They organized people to threaten to withhold their taxes and hold them in escrow. When the government saw what they were doing, they backed up.
“Martin promises he wouldn’t raise taxes in the next budget, and he promised to invite my Dad to the budget announcement and he did, and he didn’t raise taxes that year.”
Which leads him to his concerns today.
“It’s crazy the way things are going,” he says. “We pay way too much in taxes and we get way too little. It’s not like Norway, where they pay lots but get lots. It’s not like that here. We pay more, and get less.”
Sean owns and operates RWD Capital, a company that pro-vides consultancy for emerging acquisitions and cryptocurrency. He started the firm a year and a half ago after working for Mid Atlantic Capital Associates.
Prior to that, he served in the military – the fifth generation of Flynns to serve the country, going back to the Boer War. His grandfather was involved in World War II.
“My interest in politics developed early on, influenced by my father’s courageous advocacy for fiscal responsibility. I come from five generations of military service, instilling in me a deep sense of duty and commitment to serving others,” he notes. “My wife Jessica and I have experienced first-hand the sacri-fices and struggles facing families. I am determined to be a voice for all families in our community, advocating for policies that reduce costs for those struggling to survive in the most unaffordable province in the country.” Born in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island and raised in North Vancouver, Sean’s journey led him to the Royal Canadian Navy in 2008, where he served as a Naval Warfare Officer. He moved to Langford in 2010.
Transitioning from military service in 2021, he became a defense contractor.
Sean and Jessica met in the military and have been married for 13 years, and they have moved throughout the world on numerous military deployments, including a nine-month stint in the Gulf of Aden and Oman. Together, they have their three sons, aged 12, 9 and 2 years of age.
When they moved to Victoria, Sean recalls “at the time we had okay wait times for medical and a growing GDP, which was pretty fantastic, but then the NDP formed government and things took a turn for the worse,” he says.
“It’s not a coincidence that our GDP started shrinking in 2018 when the NDP came in, although the Covid lockdown affected that as well,” he notes. “I started looking at their policies, and could see clearly that their policies are strangling small business. Small business used to make up 56 percent of all jobs. This year that is down, and government has grown by 30 per-cent in the last four years.”
“In 2016, B.C. was the best in Canada for wait times for medical services, and now it’s the worst. I want to get in and make things better. It looks to me that the NDP government doesn’t have the competency to make things work better for everyone.”