KWR Logistics/Kitco Trans port has closed the doors to their transport operation that was started back in 1958, cit ing staffing issues and driver shortages as the main reasons behind this difficult decision.
Family owned and op erated, where Ron Townley started Kitco Transport in the Koo Wee Rup and Bayles area of Victoria, supplying feed to dairy farms in the area. Before long, he ventured into produce and purchased a number of trucks to support his opera tion. By the 1960s, the fleet was carrying produce inter state.
Through an alliance with BHP Hastings, the business expanded into steel transport in the 1970s, carting steel across Australia.
When Ron retired in 1995, his son John Townley took over the family business as di rector and continued to build on its success, with depots in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Koo Wee Rup.
But sadly, the business will be no more. In an open letter to customers, as sighted by Big Rigs, John explained, “It is with deep regret that I am informing you that we will be closing our business effective 28th October 2022.”
He said the decision was
made following trouble with finding truck drivers, forklift drivers and operations staff; and the resignation of several key people which the business was unable to replace.
“It has indeed been a battle through Covid and everything surrounding that which has been thrown at us, lockdowns, masks, distancing, sanitisation, employees ringing in saying they had been exposed, then not seeing them for another week, drivers doing pick-ups having to line up outside gates, waiting till everything was clear before entering, it has clearly had an impact on our management and employees,”
wrote John.
“There has also been a gen eral change in society as a result of the lockdowns, with people working from home, every thing has become a lot more about life balance and people don’t want to work long hours. This in particular is affecting our industry, and our business directly. We have long hours and we have lost a number of people in integral positions recently. As with everyone I speak to, no matter what in dustry they are in, we can’t get people. It has just made it too hard for us to continue. We are spreading ourselves too thin and there is no future for us.
“This is a gut-wrenching decision after the time and work we have put in building this business over so many years.”
Sadly, this story echoes that of various other transport busi nesses which have had to shut shop in recent times. Among those is Hilder Transport, which closed on September 30.
Managing director Bernie Hilder, had to make the tough decision to close the depot his father George established in 1972.
He too struggled to find staff following Covid. “It wasn’t as much of a problem before Covid. We had a good
crew then, but the skills were still diminishing. Younger peo ple don’t want to come in and do it,” Hilder said.
“I love what I do but couldn’t see it being sustain able. I had a profitable business but the reason we’re folding up is that the skills are just not out there to do what we need to do. There’s a big gap that we can’t fill. We had these beau tiful Kenworths but couldn’t get people to fill the seats. You might go through and trial five drivers before you find one that’s any good.”
Big Rigs has reached out to KWR Logistics/Kitco Trans port for comment.
A VETERAN of more than 30 years in the driver train ing sector believes that a proposed licensing overhaul open for industry discussion this month is fundamentally flawed.
In his detailed feedback summary to Austroads and Frontier Economics, the au thors of the National Heavy Vehicle Driver Competency Framework (NHVDCF), Armstrongs Driver Education CEO Craig Nicholson says the report “fails” with its sug gested practical time behind the wheel training and assess ment hours.
In response to what it says is industry feedback, Aus troads is proposing a mini mum of 6-8 hours of training behind the wheel for rigids, and 8-10 hours for combina tions.
But Nicholson is ada mant that “sound education research methodology” was clearly not undertaken before proposing such “highly insuf ficient” timeframes.
“The proposed 6-10 hours of behind the wheel training is the biggest flaw in the re port,” maintains Nicholson.
“With so few hours, it is impossible to teach and offer practice behind the wheel for the 130 plus areas we have identified are required to be able to drive a heavy vehicle at low risk.
“If the researchers have concluded that just one day of practical training, includ ing assessment and reversing, is all that is required, then any credibility this report may have, has been lost.”
“It appears that the re searchers contributing to this report do not understand what is actually required to teach people to drive a heavy vehicle at low-risk and with out proper consultation/ workshops with expert an expert group, followed by im portant training.
“Falling back on the prem ise that drivers are able to selfteach and work everything out themselves, is a flawed assumption. In my 36 years of experience in heavy vehicle training and licensing, I can tell you, this is not the case and is a dangerous assump tion.”
Nicholson says that plac ing faith in the National
Competencies is also a flawed approach, as it won’t deliver the required consistencies in training between states and territories.
Only specific, highly mea surable standards, frame works, curricula and assess ments, such as Armstrongs’ proven Driver Delivery Pro gram (DDP), will get the re sults, Nicholson believes.
Nicholson says the DPP, which has been up and run ning from its Melbourne base since 2016, has found training durations of between 5-10 days, depending on the
For each licence upgrade, the Consultation Regulation Impact Statement (C-RIS) also recommends three al ternate pathways for drivers based on tenure (12 months), solo driving experience or a supervision program.
Depending on the licence drivers are hoping to progress to, the supervised driving op tion route ranges from 420-560 work hours, a minimum period of between 12-16 weeks, and 6-8 hours of supervised behind the wheel sessions.
The driving experience pathway requires evidence
of 600-700 hours of driving – dependent on class jump – over a minimum of six months.
Nicholson believes that the proposed two-hour sessions for mentoring are not struc turally viable for companies to deliver or service, as wages would be paid on a minimum of four hours, plus travel, in most cases.
The ideal approach would be to use 3 x four-hour ses sions (MR to MC2) or 4 x four-hour sessions (MC3).
“Often drivers get their MR/HR license but there are no jobs around. More oppor tunities occur with the indus try looking for HC drivers. These drivers should be able to do a longer training/expe rience course that skills them up to operate a HC (e.g., a 6 – 8-day HC program) to help with both their and the indus try’s needs.”
Nicholson also says that the proposed “expedited” pathways will also not help redress the major imbalance between new license holders and the number of jobs –there are approximately three times as many heavy vehicle
licence holders as there are trucks.
“Around 80,000 to 88,000 people obtain their heavy li cence in Australia each year. The problem is that the cur rent system doesn’t create lowrisk drivers that are employ able.
“If the correct training timeframes (practical behind the wheel) and training struc ture were implemented, this
would help with the develop ment of safer, lower risk driv ers and improve employment outcomes, which is critical in helping fix the driver shortage.
“One could argue that only half the number of peo ple being licensed is actual ly required, but if they are trained and licensed proper ly, a higher number of safer and more employable drivers would be produced.”
EVERY week we receive mes sages from overseas drivers looking for work in Australia.
Truckies like Onesimo Chekenyere from Zimbabwe who is currently working in South Africa but eager to move to Australia to answer the in dustry-wide SOS for drivers.
“I have nine years of expe rience pulling superlink taut liners, which is equivalent to two trailers, and I can reverse with no issues and I have no issues with English, written or verbal,” Chekenyere writes in a recent note to us, hoping we can help.
“I hope they put truck driv ing on the [skills] priority list. I also follow your page and see the challenges the industry is facing. I just hope they give me a chance.”
The Victorian Transport Association (VTA) recently renewed its calls for heavy ve hicle transport drivers to be added to Australia’s Priority Migration Skilled Occupation List in order to help drivers like Chekenyere play their part to keep the wheels turning here.
Earlier this month the National Skills Commission
(NSC) published its 2022 Skills Priority List, with ‘truck driver (general)’ included as one of 129 occupations that weren’t considered to be in shortage is 2021.
But making that list is un likely to result in any imme diate change for the industry, highlighted the VTA.
In order for any serious short-term help in the form of overseas drivers, ‘truck driver (general)’ would need to be among the 44 on the Priority Migration Skilled Occupation List.
Applications from people in these occupations are fast-
tracked through Common wealth and state and territory visa processing schemes.
“The 2022 Skills Priori ty List simply confirms what everybody in transport has been saying for years, which is that our industry is desperate for professional heavy vehicle drivers, not just because of the pandemic, but because of our ageing workforce and an antiquated licencing regime that recognises experience over qualifications,” said VTA CEO Peter Anderson.
“Overhauling heavy vehicle driver licencing to make it pos sible for young, qualified peo ple to operate larger vehicles will help to resolve the domes tic shortage of workers.
“However, for Australia to attract competent and quali fied heavy vehicle drivers from overseas in the short-term, we need to change our skilled mi gration program to prioritise this occupation over others.”
The NSC Key Findings Report confirmed occupation shortages were most acute in Professional and Skill Level 3 occupations among tech nicians and trade workers. Heavy Vehicle Driver is a cat
egory 4 occupation, with An derson saying this needed to change for it to be prioritised over others.
“Re-categorising heavy vehicle driving as a Skill Lev el 3 occupation would give qualified, professional over seas drivers that are consid ering re-locating to Australia permanently or temporarily, a deserved advantage over peo ple in other occupations where there aren’t chronic shortages,” Anderson said.
“Our immigration rules need to change because driver shortages are also a problem for other countries, and not just Australia. Australia is compet ing against countries like Can ada, the United States and the UK for drivers, and if we gave the occupation a higher priori ty and recognised it as the pro fession it is, it would certainly help to support Australia’s pan demic recovery.”
One of the more practical outcomes of the recent Jobs and Skills Summit was the gov ernment’s decision to raise the cap on permanent migration for the first time in a decade to help fill workforce shortages.
“It’s terrific that the gov
ernment is increasing the cap by 35,000 but we want to en sure that foreign heavy vehicle drivers that who aspire to work in Australia are recognised for their professional skills and qualifications,” Anderson said.
“While immigration alone won’t solve worker shortages in transport, it can certainly pro vide a short-term boost, whilst supporting the view we are try ing to push that driving a heavy vehicle is a profession.”
Cam Dumesny, chief ex ecutive officer at the Western Roads Federation in Perth, be lieves nothing will change un
til Canberra gets the numbers right.
He points out that the skills commission says there is only 137,000 truck drivers in Aus tralia – less than the number of secondary school teacher jobs reported – yet the Australian Bureau of Statistics has the tally at over 600,000.
“Finally, and here is the flammer,” said Dumesny in an email on the issue to Big Rigs.
“The blunt reality in Aus tralia is there is no federal prob lem until it affects Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney.
“The federal political reality
(for both parties) is the rest of Australia doesn’t matter, just Sydney, Melbourne and Can berra.
“The rest of us are just out lying colonies.”
On the often-incendiary subject of questionable safety standards amongst some for eign drivers, Dumesny says steps can easily be taken to allay those concerns.
A program already in the works in Western Australia re quires that all drivers, regard less of where they come from,
be independently assessed to verify their competency to drive the combination reflected on their licence.
They would also be edu cated on current heavy vehicle regulations and taught “safe, on-road practices”.
“They are the things that drivers do on the road that ar en’t always written in a book,” said Dumesny.
“Our proposal was for a group of drivers to help devel op that course.”
Steve Shearer, executive of
ficer at the South Australian Road Transport Association, says a big part of the problem has been the way in which the NSC assessed skills shortages.
He says they used surveys of transport employers who’d re cently advertised and asked just two questions:
1. How many applicants did you get; and
2. Did you fill the job
“If you answered yes to question 2 their assumption, flawed as it was, was that means there’s no shortage,” said Shear er.
“It was only when I pushed my way through about five months ago and had a good conversation with the assistant secretary and explained to him that:
1. trucks without drivers are useless so any driver with a license is better than no drivers, because the truck has to move to earn money;
2. Truck operators are more often than not having to ac cept lower standard/skilled drivers just to get their rigs moving and earning; and
3. So the fact the job was filled does NOT mean it was filled with an appropriately skilled competent driver, just a licensed one (not ing that the governments’ competency standards for license issue are lower than industry needs)
“So, I convinced him to change their surveys and start asking the skill/competency standard question too.
“I am sure the same failing in the NSC surveys applied across other industries.”
WITH the driver shortage showing now immediate signs of letting up, transport compa nies are becoming increasingly creative with ways to attract new staff.
A surge in sign-on bonuses in the east has been the most noticeable ploy of late, with as much as $5000 being offered to lure new recruits.
At the time of writing, key ing in ‘truck driver bonus’ in the search box on Seek alone, results in 895 job options.
DSE Trucks opened with a $2500 sign-on incentive that only required drivers to work 30 hours a week and stay until Christmas in order to collect.
That amount has now re duced to $500 (plus GST) for drivers of Sydney metro taut liners (4,6, 8 and 12 tonnes) and flat-tops with gates, as Christmas has drawn closer.
But Renee Howison, driver and customer relations officer, says the response is still encour aging, with the same caveats at tached.
“They are ringing and are saying they’ve seen our ad on Facebook and seen the startup bonus and how does that work.”
“They only have to work for 30 hours and stay with us until Christmas.
“If they do that, Christmas week, we give them the mon ey, and that applies to everyone starting with us up until No vember 25.”
Geoff Crouch, executive director at Ron Crouch Trans
port, says the $2500 sign-on bonus at his company is also going well.
To qualify for that sweeten er, drivers must stay for a mini mum of six months.
But even a generous bonus, isn’t always enough to plug staffing shortfalls, as McCabe Transport, the Illawarra-based interstate heavy haulage scrap metal specialists, are experienc ing.
McCabe has $5000 up for grabs for new recruits, but of ficer manager Lana Mozer tell us that only one driver has qualified for the prorated pay ments under the scheme so far because they don’t stay long enough.
For the first 10 months of their employment, drivers re ceive an extra $500 per month in their pay, irrespective of what runs they are doing for the company.
“We’ve been running this [advertisement] for a good four or five months, and I’ve only
had one driver paid so far on that bonus program,” she said.
Even though McCabe boasts an impressive line-up of new trucks, Mozer surmises that it could be the fact that the scrap sector isn’t seen as the most desired of fields, and the drivers they do employ skew a little older, due the nature of the work.
“Another thing that goes hand-in-hand with that is a shortage of mechanics as well.
“I think that’s adding to a bit of the pressure too because we have a backlog of sending off to different places to get the trucks fixed due to the shortage of mechanics.”
Mozer says she’s seen a gen eral downturn in the number of people applying for roles, compared with this time last year.
“Twelve months ago on Seek I could have 30 emails in a two-day period for drivers applying. Now when we run it, we’re lucky to get 10.”
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Seating - on a
WITH the Victorian State Election to be held on Novem ber 26, tensions are running high, with Victoria’s major par ties clashing over a $10 billion road maintenance pledge.
The Victorian Liberal and Nationals have said they plan to increase the state’s annual road asset management budget from around $600 million a year to $1 billion a year.
“A billion dollars a year is a lot of money for road main tenance but we need it,” said Victorian opposition leader Matthew Guy. “Country roads, outer suburban roads, they need it because they’re falling apart.”
As part of the investment,
there would also be a review of construction standards, with the aim of increasing ac countability of VicRoads and contractors; and a reduction in red tape that often esca lates construction costs. There would also be an audit of all state-managed roads.
The Victorian coalition has accused Labor of cutting the road maintenance budget by 10 per cent when it came into gov ernment, and lowering speed limits on rural and regional roads to compensate for deteri orating conditions.
But Labor says it has invest ed an average of $813 million a year on road maintenance over the past four years, compared
to an average of $493 million a year when the coalition was last in office.
“We have rebuilt or re surfaced more than 10,000 kilometres of regional roads and nearly 2000 kilometres of metropolitan roads to ensure quality and safety - the largest road maintenance program in Victoria’s history,” said Roads and Road Safety Minister Ben Carroll.
The Victorian Farmers Fed eration (VFF) has called on both political parties to provide funding certainty for regional road maintenance, stating the terrible condition of country roads has reached crisis levels.
VFF president Emma Ger
mano said years of neglect and underfunding has left Victoria’s regional road network in a ruin ous state and in desperate need of investment.
“More than 50 per cent of all road fatalities occur in re gional Victoria, despite it be ing home to 24 per cent of the State’s population. We won’t accept that,” Germano added.
As part of its ‘Fair Go for Regional Victoria’ campaign, the VFF has called for a mini mum of $2 billion over the next four years for targeted arterial road maintenance.
A Wimmera district grain councillor for the VFF and chair of its transport and infra structure committee, Ryan Mil
gate, has also taken up the fight to fix his regional roads.
The road outside his farm at Minyip, 320km north-west of Melbourne, has 18 signs warn ing motorists of a rough sur face, with the speed limit per manently reduced to 80km/h as a result.
Milgate invited MPs to take a ride in his Western Star with him, so see just how bad the conditions of the roads are.
Emma Kealy, Nationals MP for Lowan; and then deputy lead er of the Victorian Nationals, Steph Ryan, who has since re signed; took him up on the of fer. They spent over three hours in the cab as Milgate travelled from Minyip to Donald, north
to Morton Plains and along the Warracknabeal-Birchip Rd, then from Warracknabeal back to Minyip. Earlier this year, Guy was also behind a threemonth campaign to find Vic toria’s worst roads, where road users, including truckies could submit road condition reports.
“Decades of neglect has left Victoria’s roads rough and potholed, risking the lives of motorcyclists, car drivers and truckies every single day,” he said.
AS part of the 2022-23 Fed eral Budget – the first under the Albanese government – a total of $9.6 billion has been
creasing rapidly, so we wel come this significant com mitment,” said NatRoad CEO Warren Clark.
ects,” he said.
“A $300 million West ern Sydney Roads Package to support planning or pre
bourne.
“While motorists will benefit most from the proj ects in South Australia, we
nami Road and nationally significant freight routes, including the Dukes, Stuart and Augusta highways.”
“Investing in national sig nificant highways and roads will help the economy while putting much needed mon
ALTHOUGH buoyed by news earlier this month that Australia is to get Euro 6 standards for new trucks, the National Road Transport As sociation (NatRoad) believes operators need to be incen tivised to take it up.
The introduction of ADR80/04 will be phased in over 12 months from No vember 1, 2024.
“Manufacturers and deal ers have been calling for this. We expected it was coming and it will give operators cer tainty so they will be able to plan,” said NatRoad CEO Warren Clark.
“But the federal govern ment needs to step up to the plate and do more to make this work.
“It now needs to work with the states and incentiv ise operators to buy the new Euro 6 trucks.”
Clark said Euro 6 will re duce payloads of trucks by about 500kg, which would add to operating costs.
“It’s up to government to cut stamp duty and registra tion charges to compensate for that or owners won’t be able to make the switch from older trucks.”
Clark said NatRoad has never been opposed to Euro 6 provided the government incentivises operators to buy new trucks.
“Improving emissions standards will have a positive impact on the environment and the health of all Austra lians.
“It will deliver newer, safer trucks by bringing us in line with Europe and UK and en couraging manufacturers to supply the Australian market.
“We just can’t ignore the increased costs of adopting Euro 6 for heavy vehicle op erators who are already under severe financial strain.”
When we first broke the news at bigrigs.com.au, read ers were dubious about the supposed ‘win’ that Euro 6 would have for the industry.
“I see more pain coming to the industry,” said Neil Haywood.
“The only winners are the truck manufacturers with mega prices of trucks these days.”
JJ Easter was also not cel ebrating the announcement from Transport Minister Catherine King.
“Win??? WTF? Obvi
ously, they don’t have any thing to do with purchasing, breakdowns or waiting on parts or replace all this emis sions crap!”
Heavy Vehicle Indus try Australia chief executive Todd Hacking said the an nouncement will give cer tainty to the heavy vehicle industry at a time when the delivery time on new orders is stretching out as long as
two years.
“This is a win for industry and a win for the entire Aus tralian community,” Hack ing said.
“Prior to this year’s feder al election we said we want immediate steps to support the transition to low and zero emissions heavy vehicles and this move is a great step for the government honouring those commitments.”
CHANGES are being intro duced to the Performance Based Standards (PBS) scheme Vehicle Approval (VA) document with the aim of helping to streamline the application process.
National Heavy Vehi cle Regulator (NHVR) CEO Sal Petroccitto says the changes, which will be introduced from Novem ber 14, remove some of the unnecessary complexity in getting a PBS vehicle ap proved.
“The PBS scheme allows heavy vehicle operators to use innovative and opti mised vehicle designs – al lowing freight to be moved in a safe way with fewer truck movements,” Petroc citto said.
“The new changes will simplify and accelerate the approval of PBS combina tions by removing the trans fer of PBS vehicle applica tions when a vehicle is sold and removing duplication, which will reduce the size of a vehicle application by 30 per cent.
“These changes are just the latest improvements in a suite of initiatives we will be delivering over the next year to reform and modernise the PBS scheme.”
The first change includes removing the operator’s name from the PBS VA. This means that the VA will become an authorisation to the vehicles listed on the VA, regardless of who owns or operates them, eliminat ing the need for a VA trans fer when vehicles are sold.
Also, subcontractors will be able to use the VA with out having to transfer it into their name.
All existing VAs will be unaffected, although oper ators with an existing VA will be able to request the NHVR to remove their name from their VA docu ment should they wish.
Access permits will also be unaffected by these changes.
In the second change, the NHVR will be replacing the specification tables with a simpler table.
Specification tables con tain key vehicle parameters, including dimensions, com ponents and Vehicle Iden tification Numbers (VINs). The new table will only contain key vehicle infor mation, such as VINs, ve hicle make and model. This will eliminate duplicated information and reduce the workload for PBS certifiers.
WE pride ourselves on hav ing the biggest social me dia following of any of the trucking titles in Australia by a good margin.
We also value your input on all manner of industry is sues on our Facebook page, which now has more than 70,000 followers, and grow ing.
For the most part, it’s a live ly, informative and let’s face it, downright entertaining forum where we give you a pretty loose rein to let us, and others, know what you think.
Please keep those com ments coming. They’re also an endless source of story ideas for myself and writing colleague Danielle Gullaci.
But unfortunately, it’s become blatantly obvious of late that a very small mi nority of commentators, who may have had their comments deleted, hidden, or even found themselves blocked by the Facebook police, need to be reminded that there are certain rules that we must abide by.
They’re pretty simple re ally: don’t use the page to spruik your own business, make racist comments, bully, or defame others.
What many of you might not be aware of is that if comments are found to be defamatory in nature, me dia outlets, such as Big Rigs, may be held liable as pub lishers of the posts. There’s talk of that changing, but for now we must adhere to the status quo. We’ll sometimes also turn off the comments on posts relating to court stories for similar reasons. Merely by publishing com ments that point the finger of blame can land us in legal hot water.
In response to our online sto ry about
PERHAPS there is too much about being taught to get a li cence instead of being taught to drive.
Too much traffic and far too many idiots driving in that traffic now to expect drivers to “learn by the seat of their pants’’ as was the case 40-plus years ago when I had to do four left-hand turns and change gears once
or twice to get my “just a farm hand’s harvest license” that actually allowed me to drive a triple road train and basically ‘’learn by the seat of your pants’’.
I don’t have the answer to how people are “taught to drive” trucks in a short time.
Perhaps there needs to be more “two-up work driving” as part of the learning to drive, but who pays?
And how many want to be the lead driver?
Because of his age (around
20-21), the insurance com pany made a rule that my son had to do three months of two-up in a B-double and without any penalties.
That three months made him a driver better than I ever was.
I do agree that having drivers from countries that seem to have a far more re laxed driving culture is not a good or safe work involve ment for other road users.
But maybe it’s a case of easier to condemn the whole
box of apples because of few bad apples?
I’m just happier that I’m not out there anymore, and the ones who should be add
ing their thoughts [to the online discussion] here are too bloody busy carrying the country.
- Ian Browne EDITOR JAMES GRAHAM
USERS of an Austra lian-made diesel enhancer can now claim carbon cred its making their trucks more fuel-efficient with an offi cial tick of approval for the product by the Australian Government’s Clean Energy Regulator.
In what is believed to be an Australian-first, operators using the product Fyrex CI
can now generate Australian carbon credit units for re ducing emissions.
Nathan Jones, the nation al account manager of Fuel and Infrastructure Manage ment Australasia (FIMA), says it’s a massive win for in dustry, especially those look ing to reduce their carbon footprint.
“Generating an Austra
lian Carbon Credit Unit means you’re actively reduc ing emissions and you can also then trade that carbon credit, so you’re generat ing another income stream while still using diesel,” said Jones.
“So, for heavy diesel us ers, those using two million litres of diesel a year, they’ll remove roughly 2800 tonnes of carbon that they’ll save going into the atmosphere.
“That equates to 2800 Australian carbon credit units and the current price for those is $30 a tonne.”
That means an extra $84,000 flowing back into the operator’s account based on the current price for a tonne of Co2t-e.
In ‘real terms’, Jones said that equates to a rebate of .7 cents per litre.
“But you also get the fuel economy savings of about 7 per cent. The savings can be massive.”
Jones said his company has also set up an aggregat ed vehicle project to take the carbon credit paperwork headache out of the equa tion for Fyrex users.
“Anyone who buys our product we can add on to that project,” he said.
“We’ve done all the legwork over the last 18 months and are happy to help people who are early adopters.”
Users just need to send FIMA their fuel data every six months.
“The only caveat the government has is that you can’t have already been using the product,” added Jones.
“It has to pass what they call the newness test. If you’re already reducing your emissions, the government won’t give you anything for doing it.”
Fyrex, a premium diesel enhancement pack, with a 2000-1 ratio is similar to other premium diesel brands on the market, the only difference is that it goes a lot further in its functions, said Jones.
Like others on the market Fyrex has an anti-foam agent and a detergent to clean the injectors, but stands out from the pack with a cetane improver.
“So, you get better bang
and engine, and less visible black smoke out of the truck as well add in the biocide and you have the cleanest fuel storage available”
For bulk users, Fyrex also supplies handy electronic dosing units that add in the product automatically to diesel tanks cutting out the need for manual handling. Finished diesel can also be delivered to your site by our network of bulk fuel distrib utors.
Up until now, Fyrex is better known in western NSW in agriculture and
mining sectors, but FIMA is hoping the carbon cred it breakthrough will entice new transport companies from the eastern seaboard to come on board.
McCulloch Bulk Haulage in Tamworth and Wickham Freight Lines are early exam ples, coming on-line with the product from November 1 to do their part in reduc ing emissions.
“We understand that die sel won’t be around forever, but what we can do is make diesel as clean as possible now.”
In a Euro 6 truck that means Fyrex users achieve about 31 per cent less CO2 and in a Euro 5 it’s 43 per cent less CO2 coming out of the tailpipe, said Jones.
“Unfortunately, the Clean Energy Regulator doesn’t recognise that as yet. We can only do it on the actual fuel efficiency, but it is something we’re working with them on to get a meth od developed where we can recognise the real world tail pipe emissions.”
The Transport sector in Australia accounts for 18 per
cent of the total greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Climate Change Au thority.
“Operators know, when they’re quoting for jobs, they’ve got to be showing what are you doing to reduce your carbon footprint,” add ed Jones.
“To be able to submit any tenders and tell them the story that they’re part of an emissions reduction project it’s going to help them win more business as well as do ing the right thing by the en vironment.”
ENGINEERS from UNSW Sydney have successfully con verted a diesel engine to run as a hydrogen-diesel hybrid engine.
The team spent around 18 months developing the Hy drogen-Diesel Direct Injection Dual-Fuel System that means existing diesel engines can run using 90 per cent hydrogen as fuel, reducing CO2 emissions by more than 85 per cent in the process.
The researchers, led by Professor Shawn Kook from the School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, say that any diesel engine used in trucks and power equip ment in the transportation, agriculture and mining in dustries could ultimately be retrofitted to the new hybrid system in just a couple of months.
The research team hopes
to be able to commercialise the new system in the next 12 to 24 months and is keen to consult with prospective in vestors.
“This new technology significantly reduces CO2 emissions from existing diesel engines, so it could play a big part in making our carbon footprint much smaller, espe cially in Australia with all our mining, agriculture and other heavy industries where diesel engines are widely used,” said Prof. Kook.
“We have shown that we can take those existing diesel engines and convert them into cleaner engines that burn hy drogen fuel.
“Being able to retrofit die sel engines that are already out there is much quicker than waiting for the development of completely new fuel cell sys tems that might not be com
mercially available at a larger scale for at least a decade.
“With the problem of car bon emissions and climate change, we need some more immediate solutions to deal with the issue of these many diesel engines currently in use.”
The UNSW team’s solution to the problem maintains the original diesel injection into the engine, but adds a hydro gen fuel injection directly into the cylinder.
The research found that specifically timed hydrogen direct injection controls the mixture condition inside the cylinder of the engine, which resolves the problem of harm ful nitrogen oxide emissions that have been a major hurdle for commercialisation of hy drogen engines.
“If you just put hydrogen into the engine and let it all mix together you will get a lot
of nitrogen oxide (NOx) emis sions, which is a significant cause of air pollution and acid rain,” Prof. Kook said.
“But we have shown in our system if you make it stratified – that is in some areas there is more hydrogen and in others there is less hydrogen – then we can reduce the NOx emis sions below that of a purely diesel engine.”
Importantly, the new Hy drogen-Diesel Direct Injection Dual-Fuel System does not require extremely high purity hydrogen which must be used in alternative hydrogen fuel cell systems and is more expen sive to produce.
And compared to existing diesel engines, an efficiency improvement of more than 26 per cent has been shown in the diesel-hydrogen hybrid.
That improved efficiency is achieved by independent
control of hydrogen direct in jection timing, as well as diesel injection timing, enabling full control of combustion modes – premixed or mixing-con trolled hydrogen combustion.
They say the most imme diate potential use for the new technology is in industrial locations where permanent hydrogen fuel supply lines are already in place.
EVEN after all these years hauling monster loads, Brad Imber admits that jobs like this still get the adrenalin pumping.
Imber, 61, is reflecting on the honour and privilege of being tasked with moving a giant de Havilland Canada DHC-4 Caribou aircraft from the Australian Army Flying Museum in Oakey on its final journey to Air Force Histo ry and Heritage, RAAF Base Amberley.
The Caribou A4-195 holds a special place in Australia’s military history, having been on countless operations since first delivered to the RAAF in 1964, including serving with International Force East Timor in 1999/2000 and in Operation ANODE in the Solomon Islands in 2003/04.
And if you want to safely transport one of these popular aircraft – affectionately known as the ‘Gravel Truck’ – by road for future generations to en joy, then Imber is your guy
to call at Brisbane-based Edge Heavy Logistics.
The former star of 2012’s hit reality show MegaTruckers has moved everything from an 850 tonne offshore drill rig compressor, to the Gold Coast light rail trams.
As a preferred carrier for over-dimensional loads for Linfox, Imber is also no strang er to hauling valuable military machinery, having successfully trucked a Mirage jet 1800km from Amberley to Towns ville over three days in 2020, and more recently a platform low-loader stacked with tank equipment to the RAAF Base Richmond near Sydney.
But Imber says every job of this magnitude, when so much could go wrong, requires painstaking preparation, and the 140km from Oakey down the Warrego Highway to Amberley presented its own unique set of challenges when he first began to nut out the logistics back in February.
“You walk into the pad dock, and you stand beside it with your tape measure and height stick you go, ‘holy crap,
this is going to be a mammoth effort’,” laughed Imber.
“But what we do is break it down, nuts and bolts. We measure it, get the height/ length and what we can legally travel with and what permits we can achieve to make that happen, and just go through the process as what we do in this industry.
“It’s a real honour and privilege to be part of moving these old heritage girls, it’s part of history.
One of the biggest tests was how to get the massive fuselage and wings on to just two trucks, Imber’s flagship Kenworth K200 Fat Cab and the other Edge Heavy Logis tics support truck, the Western Star 4800 Series driven by Des Seymour.
The original plan was to take the 10m wide wings off the plane, along with the rear stabiliser, and the rear part of the fuselage, but then the goal posts changed again.
“The [RAAF] heritage guys realised that she’s an old girl and it’d be a lot easier to leave the rear part of the fuselage on
and just take the rear stabiliser and the rear elevator off,” said Imber.
“That added another eight or nine metres on to the length of the plane so then we had to tear all the permits up and re submit again because we were longer and higher.
“We ended up being 9.6m wide [with the wings off] so that was the biggest hurdle. We ended up being 30m long and we got the height down to 5.1m.”
Imber solved the logistics puzzle after a visit to a mate at MWF General Engineering in
Brisbane.
“We sat there for a couple of hours with the CAD [com puter-aided design] drawing and got all the dimensions of the plane and trailer, lifted it at the front and back, stretched the trailer out a bit and put the belly of the plane down on the extendable part of the trailer to get the height down.
“Then I confidently rang them back that afternoon and said, ‘hell yes, we can do this’.”
Imber says a similar shift had been successfully complet ed before so he also drew con fidence from the notes he got
from the Air Force team from Static Display Aircraft Support Section (SDASS).
“The RAAF guys had a few ideas so they ran them by me and I thought that sounds very logical to me, let’s engineer that and let’s make that hap pen.”
Imber says working out how to successfully transport the wings on the back of a conventional drop-deck trailer with a 10.4m bottom deck, a configuration they use every other day, was the most com plex puzzle to solve.
as we were turning left on the Warrego.
“Due to the camber of the road, the trailer twisted a little bit and gave it a bit more of a tug than it should have.”
The only other moment that gave Imber cause for concern was when the trucks finally arrived at the Amberley base at about 3.30am the next morning.
A plane of this width is nor mally taken down the “live” side of the airport, but road works at the base meant Imber was instead asked to enter via a gate that’s not square to the road.
move by Imber and the sup port team, we got the below response from a spokesperson via email.
“The Air Force team from Static Display Aircraft Sup port Section (SDASS) are all Reservists, each of the high est calibre in their individual trades.
part in piloting the Caribou to its final landing zone will definitely go down as a career highlight.
“Even my wife [Karen] said to me two days before, ‘Are you getting butterflies yet?’,” said Imber, who is still enjoy ing driving as much as he did when he first started.
From page 12
“The wings were the hardest to get in because they were laying flat on the ground, and they had lifting points about two thirds of the way up the wings,” added Imber.
“So, when they lift them, they’re actually hanging on about a 60-degree angle.
“To bring them down ver tically into position we had to virtually manhandle them and push them in and put car tyres and tubes in between them so they didn’t get damaged in any way as they went down between the bollards and the bolsters.
“Loading the wings actu ally took longer than loading the plane.”
The only potential hurdle for expert permit specialists BSF Permits came when Im ber went to apply for access to the Toowoomba Range Bypass section of the 140km haul.
He was initially told a load of that width wouldn’t be al lowed because of roadworks still taking place in the area af ter a landslide there about 12
months earlier.
At the time of applying only 5.5m was allowed go down the range and Imber ini tially received a “full-stop no” from authorities.
Their biggest concern was that Imber would have the right-hand wing 3.5m into the west-bound lane for on coming trucks to run into.
“Once I sold him that it wouldn’t be a drama, we don’t have any wide clearances low to the trailer so we can strad dle the concrete wall okay and the signs but we just had to manage traffic control with the pilots and QPS to ensure that the inside lane on the westbound traffic was notified and warned and stopped while I traversed past the working area.”
“He was happy with that –he said let’s fly.”
After a few false starts through the year due to the in clement weather savaging the state, Imber and his support crew, which included East Coast Cranes, began loading the plane onto the two trailers
on September 27, a day before they were due to head out.
With rain again threaten ing on the day, Imber made the call to back the plane and wing trailer out on to the road about 20 minutes earlier than the scheduled 10pm start time to avoid getting bogged on the grass.
When the Queensland Police arrived, along with the team from Working iT Pilots, Imber was quickly given the all-clear to get underway.
The only real issue along the whole route came just 10-minutes into the haul when the convoy had only just hit the Warrego Highway.
“Where we had the rear part of the fuselage attached to the trailer by a retaining bolt and clip on the aircraft it actu ally snapped.
“That was basically the only drama that we had during the whole trip, but luckily it hap pened just as we turned on to the Warrego and we were going ever-so slow.
“Nothing moved. It was probably the roll of the trailer
He was told the entrance was on a “bit of an angle” but he’d still have a “whopping” 25mm clearance on either side.
“The concentration levels were pretty high,” said Imber, relieved to safely deliver the Caribou unscathed, the widest load of his distinguished heavy haulage career.
As for the Department of Defence’s reaction to the
“Brad Imber from Edge Heavy Logistics has carried out similar work for SDASS in recent years with a high level of professionalism, and played an important role in facilitat ing wide-load permits (10 me tres from engine to engine), wide-load escort pilots, as well as Queensland Police escorts and planning the travel route.”
The spokesperson also add ed that since the transfer of ownership of the aircraft from Army back to Air Force, it is the intent for Air Force to car ry out restoration and refur bishment for future display in an Air Force Aviation Heritage Centre.
The unflappable Imber concedes that playing his
“I said, yeah, not butter flies, but it’s on the front of my mind. Your mind’s going flat out. You’re driving the route, you’re thinking about things you measured yesterday.
“It certainly does liven your excitement levels up a bit and gets you really thinking.
“After we loaded the plane and we were sitting outside ready to go, my wife said, ‘Are you nervous?’, but I said, ‘No, bring it on’.
“Because everything that you can possibly do has been done, and there’s not another thing you can do that’s going to prevent what’s about to happen.
“So, you just deal with it as it comes.”
RELEASED into the Austra lian marketplace in the early 1980s as a replacement to the long-standing F-Model, the Mack Cruise-Liner took its place as the flagship cabover truck in the Bulldog breed’s product line-up.
With only a couple of hundred of the model made, they are somewhat rare to see today when compared to oth er Mack models such as the R-Model or Super-Liner.
In the case of Phillip Lamb of Bendigo, his 1981 Cruise Liner is one which was mak ing its first visit to the recent American Truck Historical Society display in Echuca, with the truck’s distinctive bronze paint scheme making it stand out from the rest.
The Mack, fitted with an Econodyne 350hp motor and 12-speed gearbox was orig inally green in colour, and had already had a consider able amount of work done to it by its previous owners in Queensland.
With the truck head ing south to Victoria, Lamb finished off the project and painted it as he explained.
“It’s Mack all through, with the motor, the air start er and Mack rear end,” said Lamb.
“When I got it, the previ ous owners had already done a lot of the work on it such as the exhaust/intake gantry and a few of their other ideas.
“I stripped it down and finished it myself and painted it, I was after something a lit tle different with the colour
“We tried a few options, and they didn’t really suit; what we ended up with is actually a General Motors bronze colour which they used on the 1981 Holden Commodore.”
It would be fair to say that Lamb has a bit of an affinity with the cabover variety of the Bulldog breed which has developed over the last four decades.
He currently has four cabover Macks in his col lection, including another Cruise Liner powered with the V8/400 horsepower mo tor, along with two F-Models from the mid-1970s.
“I’ve always loved them! I’m 56 now so back in 198182 when I was about 16, Jack
McKenna and John Kerr in Bendigo both had one doing livestock and I loved them.
“It took me 40 years to get one and now I have four! I al ways loved the Cruise-Liners, they have the airbags under the cab, and they were always finished off nicely inside.”
As stated earlier, these days a running Cruise-Liner is something of a rarity to see on the road, with only a relatively low number of units produced before the Ultra-Liner suc ceeded the Cruise-Liner in the mid 1980s.
Along the way, Lamb did a bit of research regarding num bers.
“Not many of them were made. I believe they only made
272 in all versions - slimlines, twin-steers and so on.
“They made 50 E9-400s and only 8 E9 440s in a four-year period… (for resto rations) a lot go for the Super liners and R-Models.
“They are great trucks but of course there was a lot more of them made! It would be in teresting to know how many Cruise-Liners are left, I would guess there would probably be less than 100 of them around.”
With a family background in trucks, Lamb got his licence at the age of 18, running a number of trucks over the year and today he runs a Freight liner Coranado with a B-dou ble tipper set on grain haulage.
“Over the last three years
the ‘silly’ season has been good right through but am looking at winding back a bit as I need to get to all the resto projects I have on the go at home done!” he said with a grin.
It is not strictly an all-Mack affair at his shed in Bendi go however as at the Echuca event he had also brought along another one of his re cent projects, with another iconic 1980-s era truck - a Ford LTL 9000.
“We bought that off a chap up at Narromine, where it had been used as a farm truck and painted it last Christmas.
It’s a 1985 model with a Cummins Big Cam 400 in it.
“I had an ’87 model with a 444 Cummins in it which
I ran from 1991 to 1996, and when this popped up we grabbed it!” he explained.
With an overhaul and some stainless trims applied, the Ford also got a fresh coat of paint in a black-and white scheme before its first trip away to the Lancefield ATHS event earlier in the year.
With a few events crossed off for 2022, Lamb is looking forward to doing a few more shows and rallies in the future with some of his projects and reckoned the Echuca gather ing was a worthy event to get to.
“I have enjoyed this one, there’s a lot of friendly people here and everyone is happy to talk about their old trucks…. and anything old is good fun!”
This Mack lover has lovingly restored a rare Cruise-Liner to its former glory and added a distinctive colour scheme to boot.
FROM dreaming of one day driving a truck as she watched them pass through the highway as a little kid, Kathryn Mobbs, 56, has now been named the
Queensland Trucking Asso ciation’s (QTA) 2022 Pro fessional Driver of the Year –and she’s the first ever female driver to take out the award.
“I grew up on a dairy farm on the Pacific High way in Moorland, NSW.
There were three us girls – myself and two cousins –who would watch the trucks go past. Two of us became truck drivers and one mar ried a truck driver. I always wanted to be in one of those trucks when I grew up,” said
Mobbs, who this year cele brates her 25th anniversa ry of working with Easter Group/DTC.
She credits CEO Ken Easter for being the one to give her a go. “Ken really put his neck on the line by employing me. At the time, employing a female driv er in the express game was unheard of and he copped some flak from others be cause of it. I was their first female driver and I owe all of this to the Easter family and to Ken. If he didn’t give me a start back in 1997, I wouldn’t be here. And if the Easter family hadn’t have looked after me as a second family, I wouldn’t still be here after all these years,” she said.
Easter Group describes Mobbs as the professional driver that every employer wants in their fleet. She is a quiet achiever with an out standing driving record and is well respected by all.
As an express linehaul driver, Mobbs has per formed thousands of runs for the business and has excellent mechanical and technical knowledge. With a professional attitude to wards safety, she continues to embrace innovative safety technologies as they’re intro duced into the fleet.
Mobbs had her first taste behind the wheel driving an old cattle truck on the fami ly’s dairy farm. Then as soon as she was old enough, she went for her truck licence –and she’s never looked back.
Her first truck driv ing role was four years spent transporting hors es throughout NSW and Queensland. From there, she progressed to tankers at McColl’s Transport for over four years, which was her first real foray into interstate transport, travelling all over NSW, and into Victoria and Queensland.
In 1996, she made the move to Queensland and
did local work for about 12 months, before securing a job at Easter Group/DTC the following year. “That’s where I’ve been ever since, it’s the best job I’ve ever had,” said Mobbs.
She drives a four-year-old Western Star, which she’s had since brand new, doing Star Track work from Bris bane and into Newcastle and Wyong.
To Mobbs, driving a truck as a female is nothing special, but she admits times were a little different when she was starting out. So, was it hard to get a foot in the door in the beginning? “Oooh yes,” she said. “It was unheard of for a female to be doing that sort of role. A lot of blokes didn’t like it. Head down, bum up and pretend you weren’t there, that’s how you win a lot of them over.
“One thing I’ve always
stood by is that I’m a truck driver that happens to be a female and not the other way around. I don’t play the fe male card at all.
“But people often don’t understand how different it was back then. Female driv ers got treated different at truck stops, got treated dif ferent everywhere they went. I’d ask for a key to a shower at a truck stop and they’d tell me they were only for truck drivers. But there were also a lot of truck drivers who stood up for me when these things happened.
“It’s so different now and a lot easier for women to get into the job – I wish a lot more girls would get into it.
At Easters we have a lot of female drivers now and a lot of two-up teams. Ken doesn’t even bat an eyelid about em ploying a female driver.”
And that’s not the only
thing that’s changed through her decades as a truckie. “Now the roads are better,
but the trucks are slower. The fines are bigger too, they just don’t justify the crime –if you don’t spell something right or don’t tick a box, which is ridiculous. Trucking is a lot more policed now,” Mobbs explained.
“When I started you weren’t treated like crimi nals, whereas now if you get pulled over, you’re treated like a criminal. And that got worse through Covid. When you were crossing borders, even when you knew you had everything right and had been past there that
many times, you’d still get a cop saying that’s not good enough, so the stress levels were high.”
But despite the challeng es that come with being a truck driver in this day and age, Mobbs says she wouldn’t have it any other way. “Once you get in the truck, you’re your own boss, you’re in your own world – and even after all these years, I still love driving.”
On finding out she had been nominated for the QTA’s Professional Driver of the Year award, Mobbs said,
“When our safety manager Nicolle Charlesworth nomi nated me, I was proud to be nominated but the thought of winning never even en tered my mind. It was pret ty scary to have to go up on stage because I don’t like big crowds, but Nicolle spoke for me.
“My family is very proud of me and my work – my dad was so proud when he was alive and my mum is ex tremely proud of me too. She wanted a photo of Ken and I to put on her wall, now she wants the award
THE other major prize winners at the Queensland Trucking Association’s (QTA) Road Freight Annual Industry Awards held at the Royal International Conven tion Centre in Brisbane were: Industry Excellence Award – Jim Hurley, Brown and Hurley
In Australia, you would be hard pressed to find any one more committed to the trucking industry than Jim Hurley.
Hurley has had a long and rewarding career in an industry that has made a sig nificant contribution to Aus tralia’s economy. His longterm commitment to the transport industry spans over 65 years, and although now retired from the day-to-day running of the business, you can still have Hurley turn up behind at your depot behind the wheel of your new Ken worth.
Trucking Woman of the Year – Melira Lister, QUBE Bulk
After exiting the RAAF, List er took a job in the heavy transport industry work ing in the permits area. She quickly found a passion for the industry and started to make an impact in the heavy lift and oversize overmass area.
Currently working for QUBE, as a project manager, female representation in this sector of transport is scarce but Lister never lets that get in her way.
Anyone that knows Lister can attest to her drive, ambi tion, and love for challeng ing work which has seen her quickly progress into man agement positions.
Over the past 12 years, Lister has worked on ma jor multimillion dollar in frastructure and renewable energy projects utilising her strong skills in negotiation, problem solving and advoca cy to achieve successful out comes for clients.
and Hugh Paton, Sizer and Coggil, Townsville Dean Ryan:
Dean joined Clayton’s Tow ing Service in 2012 at 18 years old. Prior to this, he was a Plumber and left the trade to pursue his interest in heavy vehicles and hasn’t looked back.
Ryan started out driving small MR tilt trays and over the past 10 years has moved his way up through the heavy fleet to perform specialised recoveries.
Colleagues describe Ryan as approachable, understand ing and with a wealth of knowledge in this specialised sector.
Hugh Paton:
After finishing high school in 2014 and Paton embarked on a dual apprenticeship of Diesel Fitter and Auto Elec trical as well as obtaining his truck licence and driving for the family business (Paton Bulk Haulage).
Paton then took the plunge and opened his own diesel fitting business called
HP Diesel Services and a year later moved up to Townsville to then commence work at Sizer & Cogill as Operations Manager, all before turning 25.
His current role sees him looking after the day-to-day running of 20 trucks and also the storage and handling of bulk products.
Knowledge of cattle be haviour, handling techniques and general principles for handling beasts are an essen tial requirement for livestock transport operators.
Identifying a gap in the training available for live stock truck drivers, the be spoke course was created by Fraser’s Livestock Transport and Athol Carter, Central Queensland manager led the development of the curricu lum.
The aim of this course is to promote safer work prac
tices and improved animal welfare outcomes for trans porting and handling live stock throughout the supply chain.
With funding support, the course has now been rolled out across three lo cations in Queensland and trained over 150 people.
The course is setting a new benchmark for livestock transport safety and animal handling training.
Innovation and Safety Award – Jarratt Transport Solutions, Safety Handle for safe top of trailer ac cess
A simple and low-cost solu tion, the safety handle pre vents slips and falls when climbing onto trailers.
The device assists the driv er to maintain 3 points con tact at all times when getting on and off the trailer which is a fundamental safety pro cedure.
Designed to simply drop into or lift from the holes in the trailer, the safety handle can be easily stored in the
trailer toolbox or dunnage carrier.
Jarratt’s Transport & Op erations Manager, Darryn Charlsworth envisioned a solution to improve safe ac cess onto trailers for drivers. Developed in partnership with O’Phee Trailers, the safety handle is now a stan dard inclusion on all Jarratt trailers.
Daimler Emerging Leader of the Year Award
Canea Mersky, South East Queensland Hauliersw
Canea Mersky is a moti vated young person who sees certainty in a career in the transport industry after start ing out at just 21.
Recently promoted to customer service manager at SEQH, Mersky immersed herself into the one-on-one coaching and professional development sessions max imising the benefits of the scholarship.
Mersky has a bright future ahead of her and was consid ered an outstanding candi date in this year’s intake.
BACK in 2017 Fuso – under the Daimler Trucks umbrella –were the first company to series produce an all-battery electric light duty truck in Japan – the Fuso eCanter.
Five years on, hundreds of eCanters are serving customers in Japan, US, Europe, Austra lia and New Zealand. Together they’ve clocked enough miles to circle the planet over 100 times.
At IAA Transportation in Germany recently, Karl Dep pen, the CEO of Daimler Truck Asia described those five years as the trial stage, while in troducing the company’s next generation eCanter.
From the current single model on offer, forthcoming eCanters will come compati ble with many types of bod ies, making it ideal for diverse applications. The vehicles will come in a range of tonnage, between 4.25 tonne and 8.5 tonne, nearly matching the offerings of the diesel Canter product portfolio. They will also come with six different wheel bases and two cab vari ants.
Another innovation is the installation of a mechanical PTO, enabling the eCanter to cater to many special-purpose applications that currently use existing equipment for diesel vehicles. This will give com panies an EV option for appli cations as varied as dry vans, tippers, rear cranes, garbage collection and all types of lo gistics.
The first generation eCant er offered a range of around 90km: take it or leave it. Gen eration two has a state of the art LFP battery technology. It comes with an all-new modu lar battery concept with three options according to wheelbase – S, M and L. The S option has a driving range of 70km, the M model offers 140km and the L model offers up to 200km. The aim of these options is to allow customers to balance range
with cost and payload.
As with the latest eActros, the eCanter now features the new eAxle where the electric motor and differential are wrapped up in one unit, al lowing more space for battery stowage.
The latest iteration also adds more safety features such as the company’s most advanced col lision mitigation brake system (ABA5) and Sideguard Assist which warns drivers about blind spots. Series production of the Fuso Generation eCant er begins in 2023.
And some of that produc tion comes from a very surpris ing place. After our whirlwind tour of IAA Transportation at Hanover, Daimler put we as sembled journalists on a bus (Mercedes-Benz of course) back to Frankfurt where we caught a plane to Lisbon, Por tugal.
Early the next morning we board yet another bus and head 145km north-east of Lisbon to the small town of Tramagal.
Rounding the final cor ner on the edge of town is a two-story white building
proudly displaying the words, eCanter.
The plant has been around since 1964, originally pro ducing military trucks under the Berliet brand name. Some 5000 were made up until 1974. The following six years saw only another 1000 trucks produced. From 1980 through 1996 67,000 Canter, Fuso, L200, L300 and Pajero were produced under various factory ownership, all for the Portugal market.
With Daimler’s purchase of Mitsubishi in 1996 the factory was also purchased and con centrated on the Fuso Canter product with distribution ex tending into wider Europe and Morocco. In all, 235,000 Can ters have left the factory.
At the main entrance we are met by Arne Barden, the expatriate German head of plant and Rui Correia, director, general operations for a presen tation on the plant’s operations and the production process of the Next Generation eCanter.
In line with its parent com pany’s ambitions, the Tramagal plant reaches carbon neutrality
this year, expects net zero by 2030 and being carbon positive by 2040.
Given the plethora of trans portation OEMs at Hanover’s IAA not only aiming for the same but actively producing product to achieve it, I could easily believe that truck manu facturers are at the forefront of changing the world’s reliance on fossil fuels.
Following lunch, and unfor tunately only a tiny sip of the delightful multi-award win ning wines at nearby Casal Da Coelheira Winery, we return for a tour of the factory.
Covering an area of over 158,000 m², the Tramagal plant employs 600 people,
making it the major employer in town – its importance in the community illustrated later in the afternoon when we take the eCanters for a spin.
The team produces a brand-new Canter every eight minutes. The factory tour demonstrates the skill of the workforce, aided by robots where necessary.
Both diesel and eCanters are produced from CKD kits on the same production line, only parting ways at the fitment of the powertrain. The eCanter will become the main focus of production at Tramagal in fu ture years.
The proof of the product is always in the pudding as they
say, so the time comes to hop behind the wheel of an eCant er for a spin, and it is here that the business’ importance to the town becomes apparent.
As I round a corner and come to a T-section, there is the local constabulary blocking traffic to allow me a free run. The next junction is the same and so on until the journey is completed. Oh, there was also a police car heading up the eCanter convoy. Did I feel im portant? Yep.
So what’s it like to drive? In Aussie slang: ‘She’s a bloody be wdy mate!’
I drove the original test eCanter here in Australia some years ago and looked up my words on that occasion. It’s safe to say that this second genera tion is more advanced on every front from road and noise in sulation to power to quality of finish – and I raved about the first edition.
The new interiors coming are light years ahead of the cur rent models. I presume we’ll get those in the diesel versions as well. As mentioned earlier the safety features are the latest and greatest.
The world she’s a-changing and Fuso, along with others, is leading the charge – no pun intended.
Graham Harsant travelled to Germany and Portugal as a guest of Daimler
THE town of Urana might have been surrounded by floodwater, and a number of roads in the Riverina may have been closed, but that didn’t dampen the spirit of show goers who gathered across the weekend of October 15-16 for the town’s annual Vintage Ma chinery Rally and Truck Show.
Making its comeback after a couple of years in recess due to Covid, the event drew truck enthusiasts from as far afield as
Melbourne to the south and Narromine to the north and everywhere in between.
With the feature brand in 2022 being Mercedes-Benz, a variety of models in all manner of operating condition bearing the ‘three-pointed star’ badge made the trip with a healthy roll out of other makes and models around the Victoria Park oval.
With Mercedes-Benz hav ing long had a presence on Australian roads, the evolution of the brand over the last fifty years was evident with a 2022
model 2663, supplied for the show by Daimler Trucks Wag ga, on display with a 1972 cab-over 1418, with the 1418 model in both bonneted and cab-over forms still held in high regard today by a number of operators.
Geoffrey McDonnell, him self the proud owner of two 1418 models, was overseeing the truck component of this year’s rally, and was delight ed with the roll up of trucks, and the benefits having such an event brings to small rural communities such as Urana.
“Having a feature brand helps get the interest out there - all these ‘Benz blokes have bought their trucks and have come here and reckon they have never seen so many ‘Ben zes in one place….this is the Clarendon for Mercedes!” he said with a smile.
As is often the case the show is put on and run by volunteers and also serves an opportunity to get together.
“In these little towns every one pulls together and makes it happen,” he said.
Two awards for the Mer
cedes Benz entrants were up for grabs, and it was a success ful trip down from Orange for Les and Greg Bird, who took out ‘Best Original’ with their painstakingly restored 1967 cabover 1418, whilst the bon neted 1924 of Lebo Blekic from Benalla, painted in its TNT ‘peaches and cream’ co lours took out ‘Best Overall’.
For all the other brands represented, the hard work put in with the polish prior to the show by Brock Gladman and Lachlan Garnock of Wagga Wagga paid dividends, as the
1988 Kenworth T650 owned by Scott Menz took honours in the ‘Truck of the Show’ cat egory.
With the event having had a successful track record stretching back over two de cades, planning will start soon for next year’s event, with the 2023 Feature Brand and oth er details to be released in due course.
One thing that does not change from year to year is when it will be, so put a mark on the 2023 calendar for the third weekend in October.
At Volvo Trucks, environmental care has long been central to our vision of the future. We care passionately about the world we live in, and as the shift towards electric vehicles gathers pace, we are more committed than ever to driving progress.
We are thrilled to announce the launch of our all-electric medium duty truck range for Australian transport operators.
The new Volvo FL and FE Electric medium duty range meet the demand from society and customers for dramatic cuts in CO2 emissions. To simplify the transition to sustainable transportation, the trucks are offered together with service and support packages for electromobility needs.
We are proud to partner with you in the transition to an electric truck future. Learn more by visiting www.volvotrucks.com.au/electrictrucks.
Volvo Trucks.
THE sun shone down brightly on Boort as the small regional Victorian town located next to Lake Boort, played host to its annual Boort Truck Show.
Held on Saturday Octo ber 8, in conjunction with the Boort A&P Society Show, the event attracted over 1000 peo ple, with 106 trucks on display.
The Boort Truck Show was first held in 2019 and though it was supposed to be an an nual occurrence, Covid meant it’s been three years before it could be held again.
Boort Truck Show organ iser Heath Saunders says the event was incorporated into the local show to help breathe a new lease of life into the pop ular community event. “Show numbers had been starting to dwindle and we wanted something to liven up the at mosphere. I’m a signwriter by trade, doing trucks only, so with the connections I had, we planted the seed and it’s been going in leaps and bounds from there,” he said, adding that the day went brilliantly.
“I think Boort was one of the few towns in Victoria that didn’t get rained on in the lead up. The weather was brilliant but the grounds were still a little soft underfoot, so we utilised some different areas of the show ground this year.
“The Boort Truck Show is a real get together. There are
a lot of trucks we have here that you don’t see in the truck show circuit because they are mainly working trucks. We had trucks coming from far and wide – from down as far as Gippsland way and into southern NSW.”
Awards were present ed across various categories, with the Best in Show prize awarded to Ben Gierisch from Gierisch Bros Trucking for his impressive black, red and gold Kenworth T909, named ‘Dancing in the dark’.
The People’s Choice award went to Craig Wilson for his Kenworth T610 SAR; the Rick ‘Chocs’ Hayman Memorial Award was presented to Phil lip Lamb for his 1981 Mack Cruiseliner; while Nichol Trading took out the gong for Best Fleet.
Other awards included Best Farm Truck awarded to Ben Rothacker’s International C1800; Best Special Purpose for Josh Parsons’ Freightliner tow truck; Best Rigid went to Mitch Grundy’s Western Star tipper; Best Display was presented to Mawson’s Con crete & Quarries; the Best Vintage award went to Ben Leech’s International C1800; K & S.L. Nelson in Balranald scored the Best Paint prize for their Bedford KM; Best Local award went to Matt and Joe Kane for their Kenworth T610
The day capped off with a spectacular evening fireworks display.
SAR; and Best Signwriting was awarded to Clinton Webb for his W900 Legend SAR.
The evening was capped off with live music by No Plans and a spectacular fireworks display.
Top 10 trucks at the show
Steve Dimit: Kenworth Legend 900
Nick Gierisch: Kenworth T909
Brad McLean: Kenworth Legend 900
Bryce Lee: Kenworth K125 Aerodyne
Steve Garner: Western Star 4900
Dale Cornfoot: Peterbilt tilt tray
Matt Maloney: Kenworth Legend 900
Mick Cleary: Kenworth Legend 900
Rod Leske: Kenworth T659
Jason Nind: Kenworth K108 Big Cab
IT’S still early days for elec tronic work diaries, or EWDs as they are known, but as the dust starts to settle on the early entrants into the market there is one EWD that is emerging as a clear favourite among drivers.
Trevor Warner, truck driver and vice president of the Na tional Road Freighters Asso ciation (NRFA) and Hubfleet user, can’t speak highly enough of it. “Hubfleet was easy to set up and get started. Data entry and location services is super fast! In the first week, I tried to break it and I failed to do so. It passed every test I threw at it.”
The NRFA is concerned that drivers and operators of ten wear the penalty of mak ing an unintentional mistake in work diaries and the EWD currently provides the best way to avoid these fines.
Setup cost can be a ma jor hurdle for small fleets and owner drivers, however this
form of data collection pro vides substantial savings to businesses and streamlines HVNL fatigue compliance for all parties. No more han dling and storage of those work diary pages, no more manually inputting of data into the existing compliance systems and no more expen sive vehicle hardware.
Hubfleet provides com plete driver compliance re ports in electronic or PDF form, making audits and law enforcement record requests and roadside enforcement much easier.
With razor thin profit margins and strict legal ob ligations, any tool that saves time, money and does the job, must be a welcome ad dition to any safety manage ment system.
We can make a positive impact on road safety by util ising these cutting-edge sys tems, so we can better man
age driver fatigue with better scheduling tools.
One of the big mistakes that drivers make is assuming that their 24-hour periods re set after a major relevant rest break. However, it is possible to have overlapping 24-hour periods. For example, a driver starts work at 8am and works for 10 hours in an 11-hour period, finishing at 7pm. They then complete a 7-hour rest and start work again at 3am the next day. By mistakenly thinking that their 24-hour period has reset, they forget to add the hours between 3am and 8am to their previous day’s total. In this example, they have worked 15 hours in the 24-hour period, starting 8am the day before. Under stan dard hours, this would be con sidered a critical breach and could be punished with a fine of up to $16k and a loss of four license points.
One area where Hubfleet
TREVOR WARNERgets lots of positive reviews is on its messaging and the fact drivers get a good amount of warning about upcom ing breaches. James Doherty, founder of Hubfleet, has been really pleased with the reviews, but he’s always listen ing to constructive feedback. “Talking to drivers, we felt there was room to improve, so I’m really excited about our next release which should be
An updated version of Hubfleet’s app will be released soon, taking the dashboard to a whole new level.
out in a few weeks as we’ll take our dashboard to a new level. There will be a ‘card’ for each period in a drivers’ ruleset that will give detailed information about potential breaches and upcoming rest requirements (pictured above). Drivers will be able to flick between over lapping periods for the same rule. This lets drivers know what’s coming over the next
few days and allows them to plan much better.”
Drivers can sign up to a 14-day free trial and start us ing the Hubfleet EWD today. And if they get to the Hub fleet website by first visiting the National Road Freighters Association and clicking on the Hubfleet link, there they’ll automatically get a 10 per cent discount on their first year.
HUBFLEET WAS EASY TO SETUP AND GET STARTED. DATA ENTRY AND LOCATION SERVICES IS SUPER FAST! IN THE FIRST WEEK, I TRIED TO BREAK IT AND I FAILED TO DO SO. IT PASSED EVERY TEST I THREW AT IT.”
SHELL Rimula has partnered with Big Rigs in a big way – so now there’s even more reasons to send in your best truck shots.
Each month, the Big Rigs team will choose a #PicOfT heMonth, with the lucky win ner receiving a $500 Shell Coles Express Gift Card.
Keep an eye out for our reg
for your best truck photos and add yours in the comments, or email them to editor@bigrigs. com.au.
Don’t forget to include a brief note about the truck and where the photo was tak en. We’ll feature some of the best photos in each edition of Big Rigs Newspaper, with
When the going gets tough, truckies keep everyone going
HERE’S how tech can help ease the burden and improve return on investment with au tomation.
2022 has brought its fair share of ups and downs, but a new year is just around the bend. While some pressure on trucking businesses has eased in the past month with the re turn of the full fuel excise and the reinstatement of Fuel Tax Credits (FTC), businesses still need to improve efficiency and maximise return on invest ment to see success in 2023.
But when you’re spending most of your time managing the day to day and often stuck putting out fires, finding time to change or update for the better can seem like a fantasy.
Tech can change that. Digital transformation leads to auto mation – for trucking opera tions, automating menial tasks, and digitising paper-based pro cesses can be a game changer, freeing up time, improving ROI and enabling growth.
Here’s how tech can help ease the burden and improve returns for your business.
Automate the menial Automating laborious tasks by
digitising paper-based process es is a simple way to ease the burden of managing day-today operations, allowing you to focus your time where it counts.
Tasks like tracking and or ganising vehicle maintenance, following up on driver sched ules and location, collecting pre-start checklists, monitor ing fuel and asset usage and ensuring compliance can all be digitised and automated with intelligent telematics technol ogy and fleet management systems.
Additionally, thanks to the data collected from sensors and AI-powered devices, you can easily gather a compre hensive understanding of the actual costs behind complet ing specific tasks. The best part? You don’t need to spend time collecting this data –it’s all at your fingertips and ready to inform quality deci sion making.
Improve operation flow Critically, freeing up your time, drivers’ time, and back-office staff time improves operation flow, streamlining every aspect of the business.
Managing trucks and assets can be complex, but with data collected via telematics and access to digitised pre-start checklists, you can under stand the condition of each vehicle without needing to inspect them physically and address potential issues im mediately. Additionally, with predictive maintenance tools, you can ensure that vehicles are serviced proactively.
You’ll reduce the chance of unexpected breakdowns or incidents in the field, which can bring your operation to a halt. Instead, you’ll know everything is taken care of, so things run smoothly without your direct oversight.
Relaying information to customers is also a simple process when you have quick access to information. Rath er than tracking down your drivers or sorting through paperwork to find the nec essary info, you can check in with your fleet management system and report back to the customer efficiently. You’ll free up your time while improving
customer satisfaction – paving the way for new work.
Free up time for strategic thinking
The benefit of technology and automating tasks in your transport operation boils down to this: rather than a scarcity mindset that focuses on reducing spending and just scraping by, you can em
brace an abundance mindset, focusing on strategic initia tives, improved returns, and growth.
All this helps you im prove your business offerings, customer experience, and brand recognition to bring in new work – so instead of just weathering challenges in 2023, you’ll be able to rise above them.
Video AI uses in-built sensors to provide real-time insights into behaviours via audible alerts to the driver.
Digitised coaching & training via a dedicated driver app to help focus on improving performance.
Create a balanced program that rewards positive actions and communicates areas for improvement.
Helps to reduce costs through improved behaviour by managing areas of harsh usage and efficiency.
AUTOMATING LABORIOUS TASKS BY DIGITISING PAPER-BASED PROCESSES IS A SIMPLE WAY TO EASE THE BURDEN OF MANAGING DAY-TO-DAY OPERATIONS, ALLOWING YOU TO FOCUS YOUR TIME WHERE IT COUNTS.”
IN days gone by, valves or taps at the bottom of a truck’s air tanks were opened at the end of each shift to let accumulat ed water spit out. This reduced the amount of moisture that found its way into more sen sitive parts of the air system, including vital brake parts and transmission slave pistons.
With the ongoing evolu tion of commercial vehicles, the proliferation of new pneu matic powered accessories has increased demands on vehicles’ compressed air sys tems. From kneeling buses to multi-axle ABS brakes, new applications have raised the requirements for clean, dry air, straining existing technologies and creating a need for more efficient and reliable air dryers.
The SKF Brakemaster family of air dryers is meeting those needs.
In addition to units de signed for high-value per formance in conventional over-the-road applications, the SKF Brakemaster line in cludes air dryer units specifi cally designed to handle the extreme air system demands for such industries as transit and refuse.
The Turbo-2000 is the rec ommended choice for severe service applications, where the compressor output reaches 30 CFM and duty cycles run as high as 40 per cent.
Its ratio of large purge vol
ume to desiccant produces the ideal filtering system and contamination protection for heavy duty service today. A four-way filtration sys tem, consisting of three filter screens, a unique filtering bag, plus four pounds of high qual ity molecular sieve desiccant, strips away moisture and traps compressor blow-by. The spinoff cartridge can be serviced in minutes. The compact purge tank can be installed anywhere and provides a full 460 cu. in. of clean purge air.
The best just got better – with SKF’s Filtration Plus Option for Turbo-2000 and HD2000.
As more components draw on the vehicle’s compressed air system, air quality has become critical. A contaminated air system dramatically adds un wanted operating costs that the new Filtration Plus Option can avoid.
The Filtration Plus Option provides the same benefits as the current SKF series of air dryers but adds an additional two-stage high efficiency filter
that removes even the finest oil residue. The Filtration Plus Option specifically addresses high air volume applications, such as transit, refuse or ce ment mixers.
The benefits of the air dry ers equipped with the Plus Option are plentiful:
• Protection of downstream valving that gums up with oil contamination.
• Improved air capacity. Compressor charge times increase as oil and water filled wet tanks reduce air capacity.
• Improved compressor ser vice life. Coked up dis charge lines cause the com pressor to work harder shortening its service life.
• Extends air dryer cartridge service life. The two-stage filtration system added to the al ready extensive cartridge filters extends the service intervals.
• The two-stage Fil tration Plus Option is self-cleaning with every purge cycle keeping the perfor mance optimised.
IN ADDITION TO UNITS DESIGNED FOR HIGHVALUE PERFORMANCE IN CONVENTIONAL OVERTHE-ROAD APPLICATIONS, THE SKF BRAKEMASTER LINE INCLUDES AIR DRYER UNITS SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO HANDLE THE EXTREME AIR SYSTEM DEMANDS FOR SUCH INDUSTRIES AS TRANSIT AND REFUSE.”
• Easily retrofits and upgrades the filtration system of any existing SKF Turbo series desiccant air dryer with a cartridge Plus kit T224-P. For more information, vis it vsm.skf.com or email chris. hayes@skf.com.
WITH so much press focusing on the significant increases in home loan rates and interest rates in general, it is timely to have a look at what this means for businesses.
Where the five-year fixed home loan rates increased to around 6.5 per cent, it won’t be surprising that motor vehicle and equipment finance interest rates have also moved into the 7 per cent plus range.
As recently as one year ago, home loan rates, and equipment and motor vehicle finance rates,
were around 3 per cent or lower. So, what is the effect of these in terest rate increases in real terms and how may this affect your business moving forward?
Unlike home loans where a doubling of the interest rate re sulted in an increase of 45 per cent or 100 per cent in the monthly payment, the monthly payment effect on the equipment finance loan was much lower at around 8 per cent. This is simply due to the shorter term where the entire debt is fully paid off over five years.
In a world where businesses are seeing increased costs across the board in such areas as labour, materials, as well as the actual purchase cost of vehicles and ma chinery, the cost of debt (interest rates) is also one of these increas ing costs.
In summary, businesses today can:
• Access the Finlease calculator on our website to test payments on a range of interest rates (finlease.com.au/equipment -finance-calculator)
• Review your costs of doing business and adjust pricing ac cordingly
• Utilise the expertise of a finance broker to seek out the most fa vourable equipment finance solutions
The reality is that the harder you hit the brakes, the sooner you slow down the inflation, howev er if you hit the brakes too hard, you risk stalling the economy, which can lead to a recession.
The RBA will need to closely monitor this to get the balance right.
The best intel we can see
at this stage, is around 12-18 months, or when inflation re turns to the 2 to 3 per cent band required by the RBA to stabilise inflation to an acceptable level. Once this band is achieved, we can expect interest rates to re main at the level required.
However, if inflation drops below this desired band, we can reasonably expect to see some re duction in those interest rates to ensure Australia has a soft land ing and avoids a recession.
Our advice is to also utilise
the expertise of your finance partner or accountant.
Businesses should also be planning their truck or vehicle purchases before June 30 to take advantage of the government tax incentives that are ending June 30, 2023.
This incentive is available for new and used (including private sales) for any company with a turnover of less than $50mil lion.
To find out more, please visit finlease.com.au.
How long can we expect these increases before we reach the peak?
IF INFLATION DROPS BELOW THIS DESIRED BAND, WE CAN REASONABLY EXPECT TO SEE SOME REDUCTION IN THOSE INTEREST RATES TO ENSURE AUSTRALIA HAS A SOFT LANDING AND AVOIDS A RECESSION.”
ALEMLUBE has formed an al liance with ILC which designs, manufactures and assembles a wide range of grease and oil systems for use in close to every imaginable lubrication system application.
Manufactured in Italy, and covered by a two-year warran ty, the Alemlube ALS system can be used on trucks, trailers, wheel loaders, excavators, mini skid steers, front, side and rear loaders, AG sprayers, hay bail ers, waste recycling plants and many fixed plant applications.
Automatic lubrication sys tems reduce maintenance time by utilising small amounts of fresh lubricant that are added every hour of operation, ensur ing that contaminants are kept well clear of bearings and other key components thanks to a col lar of fresh grease. In this way, wear and tear is kept to an abso lute minimum and mechanical components can achieve their maximum life. On top of that, equipment can be kept in pro
duction longer, saving precious maintenance resources for more important jobs.
In the transport sector, fleet owners and owner operators can benefit by having their rigs on the road more, with less down time and lower running costs.
Alemlube has compared the greasing labour and lubrication related running costs of a large heavy-duty interstate truck fleet.
The key cost components checked were greasing labour, grease cost and shackle pin and king pin replacements – these are the key greased front sus pension components which require costly parts and repair costs when worn.
The results of the research were surprising. Shackle pin life of 600,000km and king pin life of 1,200,000km was the best previously attainable by diligent hand greasing and normally attainable by liquid grease lu brication systems. That meant that during the life of the truck, costly downtime was required to
replace these key components.
John Knight, Alemlube’s Lube Systems product manag er, believes that the Alemlube lubrication system as manufac tured outside Milan is taking transport equipment lubrica tion to the next level.
“The pump station has fea tures and benefits that will set new standards and expectations within the industry in Australia and New Zealand,” he said.
“The Alemlube ALS pump station is manufactured from the latest engineering polymer materials making it lighter, stronger and more durable and it can be used in the harshest operating conditions with maxi mum exposure to the elements.”
Designed and built to be used with NLGI2 grease as specified by many OEM man ufacturers, with this grease sys tem owners and operators can not only use the grease of their choice but they can also use the grease type specified by the rele vant OEMs, in some insistences
keeping warranties in place and effective.
Another benefit of utilis ing the Alemlube ALS system is that grease points can’t be missed, with difficult or hard to reach points kept perfectly greased regardless of servicing schedules.
With trained and experi enced BDMs and technicians located around the country in their Brisbane, Sydney, Mel bourne, Adelaide and Perth branches, plus technicians stra tegically located in Townsville and Toowoomba, when instal lations or service work are need ed, Alemlube will be there for you as and when required.
If you would like to hear more about how the Alemlu be ALS system works and how it can improve your operat ing times, reduce running and maintenance costs and lift pro ductivity and profitability, con tact your local Alemlube Lube Systems BDM. Visit alemlube. com.au for more information.
BASED in Coopers Plains in Brisbane, Fortuna Straightline Engineering has a history in workshop servicing and re pairs that extends back almost 80 years.
Started in 1943, Fortuna Straightline Engineering has a wealth of knowledge in the transport industry, with loy alty and dedication to its cli ents, suppliers and staff being at the heart of its values.
A dedication to providing a high level of customer ser vice has seen customers com ing back time and time again, with many customer relation ships enduring for decades.
Trucks, whether big or small, are the livelihoods of its customers, so Fortu na Straightline Engineering is dedicated to getting your vehicles back on the road as quickly as possible.
With so many years of experience, industry-leading equipment and extensive quality control procedures at Fortuna’s workshop, you can be sure that your vehicle will be repaired to the highest quality standards, with the shortest possible downtime.
Long-established relation ships with a network of parts suppliers ensures the fastest possible delivery of all parts required.
Among the specialist ser vices offered by Fortuna are general servicing and tuneups, wheel alignments, gen eral truck and trailer repairs, axle correction, crack testing, brake rebushing and electri cal services.
Fortuna carries out front and rear alignments on trucks and aligns drive axles on trail ers. If your wheel alignment is out, it can increase your fuel burn, decrease your tyre life and your vehicle power. That’s why Fortuna Straight line Engineering recom mends getting a wheel align ment every 6-12 months, which will save you money in the long run.
On site at the workshop is
a 250 tonne hydraulic press, which is used to press bush es out of suspension arms, or any seized components you are having trouble pressing out.
As an approved Inspection Station, Fortuna can also test to check over all suspension components and bushes with its shaker/brake tester.
As some makes and mod els of trucks can be built for international roads, the camber of the axle can be set much differently to what is suited for Australian roads.
With regards to axle correc tion, when your camber read ing is low, and you require the axle to be re-set, Fortuna can reset the axle beam for cam ber, caster and KPI.
And if your truck has been in an accident, crack testing can be performed on your axle and all of the steering compo nents. Fortuna thoroughly checks the axle beam, tie rod, tie rod ends, king pins, steer
ing arms, bolts and draglink for serviceability and trueness.
The expertise Fortuna has developed over the years means it can repair all kinds of vehicles, machinery and equipment. It’s a true onestop shop for all your mechan ical needs. Whatever kind of vehicle you need repaired, you can rest assured that Fortuna has seen it before and knows exactly what to look out for.
WITH SO MANY YEARS OF EXPERIENCE, INDUSTRYLEADING EQUIPMENT AND EXTENSIVE QUALITY CONTROL PROCEDURES AT FORTUNA’S WORKSHOP, YOU CAN BE SURE THAT YOUR VEHICLE WILL BE REPAIRED TO THE HIGHEST QUALITY STANDARDS, WITH THE SHORTEST POSSIBLE DOWNTIME.”
Bigger machines too Aussie’s Australian conceived and designed range also in cludes steam cleaners that go up to 4000 psi with 15l/pm flow and temperatures to 130°C. These machines are favoured by workshops or wash bays where efficiency is key.
“From our experience, we’ve found that you get just as much impact on a greasy surface with 90°C steam (yes it looks like steam although it’s hot water) as you would running the machine at 130°C or even hotter. Using the machines this way con serves fuel and expends the life of the unit,” said Lorenz.
Protecting the steamer Safety controls built into Aussie steam cleaners make them robust and efficient. There’s dry running protec tion that prevents damage
to the pump, a timed to tal stop that automatically shuts down the boiler when the gun is closed and a mi cro-leak detection warning that alerts the operator to leaks in the hydraulic cir cuit.
For further information from Australian Pump In dustries visit the website at aussiepumps.com.au.
COLD water pressure clean ers blast off mud to expose the machine components for inspection, but steam clean ers deliver faster cleaning when searching for oil or hy draulic leaks.
One Australian compa ny has designed a range of powerful hot wash and steam cleaners specifically for the Australian transport and heavy earthmoving indus tries.
“We designed these ma chines to suit ‘time poor’ truck operators who want to minimise time spent on maintenance and cleaning gear,” said Aussie Pumps’ operations manager Hamish Lorenz.
“Using a combination of
pressure and steam makes pre-service cleaning efficient and effective. Steam melts away any oil or grease en abling service technicians to identify any leaking seals fast.”
The Aussie Sizzler is de signed to give the market a hot water machine that is great value, easy to use and simple to service. It is a single phase 240v machine suitable for professional cleaning with capabilities up to 1800 psi and 80°C steam. Adding a turbo for tough applications increases the effective work ing pressures to 3100 psi.
“Of course, the turbo doesn’t apply when using the machine at high tempera ture. The turbo will work
like a charm but only at cold to warm temperatures,” said Lorenz.
Built to last
The Sizzler, like all Aussie hot wash and steamer machines, has a stainless steel cover. It also features a robust steel chassis with built in bumper, four big wheels for easy mo bility and the integrated dashboard is conveniently lo cated for easy control. These machines have been a huge hit with truck operators.
Users told Aussie Pumps they needed a full day’s op eration from the fuel tank.
An 18-litre fuel tank was de signed into the machine to hold the diesel fuel that pow ers the burner.
also be given to the most suit able location for an Arrester Bed in order to mitigate risks to all motorists,” it read.
If any driver has used one, please let me know.
How often do truckies use those arrester beds beside highways, which are provided as an escape route for runaway heavy vehicles?
I have been asked that question a lot over the past year at roadhouses but I don’t know the answer.
In fact, since asking truck ies about the subject, not one has admitted to using them.
The following is info pro vided by the Main Roads Department of WA and I imagine it would be common around Australia.
“They make a bed of light weight spherical aggregate placed in a strategic location towards the bottom of a long steep descent. Damage to heavy vehicles using an arrest er bed is minimal, especially in comparison to the damage caused in a crash. The heavy vehicle is safely decelerat ed and stopped by the drag caused by the vehicle as it sinks into the bed material. Where possible, if the arrester bed is able to be sloped upwards the force of gravity will assist the safe stopping of the vehicle. In a project, the need for a Truck Arrester Bed should be deter mined by a risk analysis before design. Consideration should
A shortage of drivers seems to be a genuine problem for the road transport industry on many parts of the mainland but across Bass Strait in Tas mania the opposite seems to apply.
Spy has received communi cations in the past week from Apple Isle drivers who reckon work is difficult to come by at the moment.
“It is a seasonal thing and I am doing one day a week and enjoying it. Things will be back to normal soon hope fully,” one lone time southern Tassie owner-operator said.
This fellow wanted to know what I had heard about a driver shortage on the big island.
The other three take the opportunity to ensure their trucks are in top shape with all maintenance done.
The Puma Roadhouse beside the Bruce Highway near Bow en in North Queensland has impressed truckies who stop off their and purchase cooked fish.
One driver who does the Central Queensland to North Queensland run said it was cooked fresh and delicious.
“It used to be the BP Mer inda and is smaller than three other roadhouses in close
proximity. But the bloke sells great fish and I always pop in there for a serve,” he said.
The driver is a connoisseur of fish and had no doubt it is Spanish mackerel.
“I am going to ask him where he purchases it from,” he said.
There was a bit of a hu morous ending to my conver sation with the truckie nick named ‘Ton’.
“If I keep eating it as of ten I’ll end up 10 ton,” he quipped.
Having interviewed truck ies at random for more than 20 years I have come across many.
I often get asked who would rate as the tallest and shortest in stature.
Well the shortest is not so easy to identify as there has been many around the 150cm mark.
But the tallest stands out like dog’s you know what.
It was a gentle giant who
stood at 215cm tall and with size 17 feet to boot.
It was in 2004 and was Mackay based truckie James Coles and at the time I saw him he worked for S & K Transport.
The then 32-year-old Coles weighed in at 130kg and loved nothing better than a huge juicy steak when he stopped at one of the many roadhouses during his travels.
“I have a big appetite and like a big rump or T-bone steak and would eat a dead horse when I am hungry. I drive a Kenworth K104 to Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth and carry a lot of bananas in the refrigerated B-double. It is a great company to work for,” he said.
Coles would have been equally successful at a basket ball career had he taken that path in life but he is passion ate about his job in the road transport industry.
Beanstalk, Highway to Heaven, Mount Everest, Kos ciusko, Skyscraper, Big Bird, Daddy Long Legs, Stretch, Tallie, and Skylab are some of the regular nicknames given to Coles by other truckies and people he dealt with daily.
His late father Brian – who was known as ‘Bones’ in the industry was a well known Sydney truckie who died in early April 2007.
“Dad used to drive for many years interstate via Gundagai to the Northern Territory and had a big influ ence on me. I started driving a
forklift at the Sydney markets and later became a truck driv er,” he said. Brian was 188cm tall.
Coles tipped the scales at a huge 12lb 8 ounces when born and said he was the tall est student at Crown Street Primary School in NSW.
“I was even taller than all of the teachers,” he said.
After leaving Sydney, James moved to Brisbane for some time and then to Mack ay in 1998 and at the time of writing had worked for S & K Transport for eight months.
I don’t know where Coles got to but would love to catch up with him. And I have nev er met a taller truckie since.
An interstate truck driver passing though Hay in NSW was very impressed with the politeness of some local resi dents.
“I was delivering some goods and saw a group of lo cals heading somewhere and
they made a point of com ing over and thanking me for keeping the town stocked. It was nice as in some towns you are treated like a leper if you are a driver,” he said.
Hay is a town in the west ern Riverina region. It’s the administrative centre of the Hay Shire local government area and the centre of a pros perous and productive agri cultural district on the wide Hay Plains.
Located approximately midway between Sydney and Adelaide at the junction of the Sturt, Cobb and Mid-West ern Highways, Hay is an im portant regional and national transport node.
The town itself is built be side the Murrumbidgee River, part of the Murray-Darling River system. The main busi ness district of Hay is situated on the north bank of the river.
Our driver mate said he saw lots of flood water as he passed through Tenterfield, Glenn Innes and others.
While the Melbourne Cup (being held on November 1) may be known as the “race that stops the nation”, Spy takes a look at some other races that take place on a much smaller scale.
Over the decades, I’ve covered all sorts of races. These are some of my most memorable.
These used to be held up the main street of outback Hughenden after the pigs were caught in the bush the night before.
A fence was erected up the main street the next morning but it still involved a few “escapes”.
Each starter was raffled off with profits going to charity. Two of the organisers were Les and Kelly Carter. The races stopped after a few years due to complaints made by animal lovers.
Although the pigs were treated humanely and released.
These were held at the hamlet of Evandale in Tasmania and I only ever
saw them once. Ferrets were illegal to have without permits in those days, except in Tasmania. They were placed in pipes beside each other which formed the track and would be involved in numerous races on a Saturday afternoon with proceeds going to charity.
These are still held annually in February at Evandale and at another venue in South Australia I am told.
A NSW truck driver was a rider for some years. They were a great spectacle, racing around the streets of Evandale during the annual fair.
Held at outback Richmond in Queensland for many years, men, women and youngsters would enter in their own category as part of the Fossil Festival near Brontosaurus Korner and toss huge and heavy moon rocks (up to 25kg) and then have their distance measured.
Local Connor Kersch, who now owns a Townsville
construction company with many trucks, won it one year.
Held some years during the annual Rediscovery weekend celebrations at Cooktown, male mud crabs (bucks) with giant nippers would be caught in the Endeavour River and placed in a circular flat track and the first to crawl to the outer would win. Proceeds went to charity. That weekend there was a re-enactment to the landing of Captain Cook and his crew on Endeavour River on June 17, 1770.
There were also homemade billy karts racing down the hilly street, which smashed into the hay bale barriers.
Mud vehicle racing was held at Sarina for years and is a great spectacle.
But if you were a spectator you had to be careful not to get splashed by flying mud. I used to love going there.
Dunny races are still held
as part of the Winton Outback Festival and also used to be popular at Gumlu which is a hamlet 40km south of Home Hill beside the Bruce Highway.
Gumlu is the small crop capital of North Queensland and is famous for farms growing rockmelons, honey dew and other fruit and veggies.
The most common of these weird races by far are held at Club Crocodile Airlie Beach and on Magnetic Island.
I went to them once at the Republic Hotel in Townsville when it was run by the late Terry Wilshire who has since passed away.
The building was sold and revamped and will soon open again under the name of the Empire Hotel like it once had been.
These used to be held behind the Kajabbi Hotel in the outback and
involved small crustaceans caught in the nearby river, and were highly successful.
This was a highlight during Julia Creek’s Dirt n Dust Triathlon weekend. Clown Windy Wizard would stand on a small hill and punters would pay a few dollars to toss a cow poo at him. Money raised went to charity.
I attended numerous camel races at Boulia and there were also some in others states such as NSW, WA, SA and Victoria.
I got invited to one once when it was held at a truck depot in the Bohle industrial suburb of Townsville. I enjoyed it and so did the 100 spectators.
They were held once at Capella in Central Queensland and I attended. Guest jockeys were on hand including the local copper.
Outback surf carnival I went to five at the Blue Heeler Hotel at Kynuna and so did scores of off duty truckies, Proceeds went to RFDS and entrants built boats from cardboard and placed them around their bodies and sprinted up a dry creek. I also went to one before that at Chinaman Creek near Charters Towers.
And back to horse racing: The Cape York Cup horse race was run on the beach near Punsand Bay Resort and what a success it was. More than 300 spectators would watch as wild horses raced and were released later.
Remarkably one year the winning horse Duncan was picked up in the scrub paddock 12km from the race venue the afternoon before the race.
“Duncan had to be enticed into the tandem trailer with hay and a bucket of molasses by the jockey and his sister, and was taken to a field for a meal of hay,” a trainer told me.
GMP Law is investigating a class action and the compensation could potentially be a significant proportion of the purchase price of the vehicle.
There is no risk or cost to you for being a class member.
There is no risk or cost to you for registering.
If you have owned a Hino vehicle made between 1 January 2003 and 2 August 2022 you may be entitled to significant damages.
To register please visit: www.hinoclassaction.com.au
Hino misreported the Performance, Fuel Efficiency, and Emissions of their vehicles.
FOR far too long as own er-drivers and small fleet op erators we have fallen into the familiarity of how things have been in the road transport sector. This familiarity breeds complacency and is was com placency that killed the cat.
This complacency will cost every small business in Austra lian, every owner-driver and every small fleet operators very dearly in the not too distant future.
In my previous Big Rigs articles - In The Shadow of Today Already Walks Tomor row as well as the Can our Fu ture be left to Politicians and Bureaucrats - I have raised a number of different ideas and hopefully caused not only drivers but owner-drivers and small fleet operators in partic ular to and give some consid eration to what I had written.
If they haven’t provoked
some thought, they really should because it will be us as drivers, owner drivers and small fleet operators who will need to force the significant and far reaching changes to put this critical industry sector on the right path
In my last article I raised the issue of the 3 R’s, Recog nition, Respect and Remuner ation. Unless we as individuals give ourselves the Recognition and Respect as well as demand the Remuneration we deserve nothing will happen.
It is my very firm belief, from a business prospective, there needs to be some very significant, far reaching and fundamental changes in the road transport industry.
As operators, owner drivers and small fleet operators it is our responsibility to demand these changes happen.
As Winston Churchill said: “One man/woman with con viction will overwhelm a hun dred who have only opinions”.
As individuals I believe we have a moral responsibil ity to start demanding action be taken by all the decision makers and lobbyist for the industry (industry representa tives groups) involved in the
day-to-day administrative and legislative aspect of the road transport industry.
Two major fundamental things need to happen. Firstly, there really needs to be a Royal Commission into this industry sector.
The road transport industry in far too critically important to every Australian and every small business to continue op erating as is currently the case.
The politicians and the bu reaucrats have created a mon ster over which they no longer have control.
The second and major fun daments requirement is a ref erendum on having the road transport sector fall under fed eral control.
We have five state transport departments and two territo ries pissing on their individual state and territory boundaries marking their territory to the detriment of everyone in volved the road transport in dustry.
The fact that states have individual control over this in dustry would have made sense back when the constitution was drafted. In the world we live in today, the sheer volume of movements across state bor
ders would have been beyond the comprehension to the leg islators responsible for the cur rent constitution.
We have the Nation al Heavy Vehicle Regulator, which is basically a toothless tiger, at the mercy of the state transport departments.
This is very evident from the day-to-day working of this supposed national regulator. We are now in a ridiculous situation where there is now national and state legislation
which operators, owner-driv ers and small fleet operators have to contend with on a dayto-day basis.
As those involved at the coalface in this industry can testify, if the coffers are low there is one sure way to top up the monetary shortfall, have state road transport officers and the police conduct a blitz.
There are mountains of infringements from menial clerical errors to any number of nonsense infringements to
rake in a lot of money in a very short time.
I have no issues where there is genuine safety issues but there is no need for the in dustry to be subjected to the bullshit revenue raising that happens far too often.
It is driving good, dedicat ed operators out of the road transport industry to the fu ture detriment of every Aus tralian and more importantly business generally right across the country.
THE findings of the Govern ment’s most recent Labour Market Insights survey prob ably won’t surprise you, but they are, nevertheless, cause for great concern. At the same time, however, they also pres
ent a great opportunity.
The statistics identify fe male industry representation in the heavy vehicle, freight and logistics industries at just 24.5 per cent compared to a level routinely in the mid-40s in other Australian industries.
It is far worse with com mon roles such as truck driver at just 3 per cent, and motor
mechanics and fitter/welders both at just 1 per cent.
If that doesn’t reek of an excessively male dominated in dustry, nothing will.
Meanwhile, we complain about the shortage of new peo ple entering the industry and our aging workforce.
Talking to our members, the lack of available skilled la
bour is far and away the big gest issue facing our industry presently.
And yet there is such an abundant untapped resource that we seem to have ignored, or worse – deterred - from joining our vital Australian industry.
In the face of what is an almost crippling skills short age, HVIA has joined forces with the Australian Logistics Council (ALC) to seek an industry-wide exemption by applying to the respective state anti-discrimination commis sions.
Enabling exclusive invita tions to females to enter the heavy vehicle and logistics industries is a win-win – but needs anti-discrimination commission buy-in to pro ceed.
We have been working to gether on this plan since the Surface Transport Roundtable held by Transport Minister Catherine King back in Au gust.
If approved by the juris dictional commissions, the exemption would allow all in dustry participants to opt-in to the scheme and advertise roles for “female-only applicants.”
The nation is crying out for our services to keep the supply chain moving.
That is good news in the sense that demand for new safer, more efficient trucks and trailers is at record levels.
The pipeline of forward orders blowing out because we just can’t make them quick enough.
The road freight industry is in the same boat and both HVIA and ALC agree one of the fastest solutions is to make the industry more attractive to the largest under-represented labour cohort – females.
The application acknowl edges the contributions of the existing female workforce:
The feedback from our members is very strong. Fe males are great contributors in the workplace. They are safe, measured, professional, responsible, and reliable. We believe increasing the percent age of their representation will be a positive impact for our industry.
Our members, across all sectors, offer dynamic, reward ing careers in a vast range of different areas.
If we are successful and in dustry members are granted
an exemption, we believe they will see an increase in female participation, more applicants and a greater chance of filling a vacancy.
The scheme would be free and open to all HVIA and ALC members, and any other business identifying as part of the industry.
There will be a simple ap plication process which binds participants to record-keeping and sharing the results of the advertising campaign for re porting back to the Commis sions.
There is no question that the gender diversity scale needs to be tipped dramatical ly; there has never been a more opportune time to welcome vastly improved female par ticipation across our vital and rewarding industries.
TALKING TO OUR MEMBERS, THE LACK OF AVAILABLE SKILLED LABOUR IS FAR AND AWAY THE BIGGEST ISSUE FACING OUR INDUSTRY PRESENTLY.”
TRANSPORT Women Aus tralia Limited has been busy in the last few weeks.
We have had a combined breakfast with the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator at Ballarat, and although we had a small audience, we had a very robust conversation with some great takeaways from our wonderful presenters, Belinda Hughes, and Dallas Henderson of the NHVR prosecution team.
We had our first Learning Initiatives Breakfast for some time in Sydney, hosted by our wonderful sponsors TWU SUPER and RT Health.
This breakfast was over subscribed, and everyone went away extremely happy with some valuable infor mation from our speakers, Varenya Mohan-Ram, and Alison Weatherill, all looking
forward to the next TWAL event.
I also attended the Hong Kong Trade Development Council luncheon hosted by director Bonnie Shek and brought together by Law rence Christoffelsz of the Australian Trade and Logis tics Council to talk about the upcoming Asian Logis tics, Maritime and Aviation Conference (ALMAC) 2022 which is being held both vir
tually and in person.
We also discussed the lo gistics of taking a delegation of carriers and other transport and logistics personnel to AL MAC 2023 in Hong Kong.
We will bring you more in formation about this in the future.
TWAL co vice chair Cora lie Chapman and I also at tended the Boort Truck Show for the first time. This was held in conjunction with the
Boort Agricultural show and was a fantastic day.
We were hosted to the show by TWAL members Whitmore Bus Lines and spent the day with our 2021 Trish Pickering Memorial Award winner, Hazel Whit more, and her son Jamie.
We would like to thank Jamie, also Alan Griffiths of BTE and his customers for helping us set up the stand. I am sure we will be back next year for the show, with things
getting back to normal we are looking forward to attending more regional shows such as the Koroit show in January 2023.
We have all our upcoming EOY functions. We have Ce MAT in 2023 and later this month will be shooting our full video which we are really looking forward to launching. It is taking a lot of work and coordination, but it will be worth it!
I had my first interview
with Simon Smith of the Australian Truck Radio 24/7 radio channel, and we plan to make this a regular spot, something else I am really looking forward to doing.
We are also looking for speakers and sponsors for my Import Export TV show, Talking Transport.
Our Driving the Differ ence scholarship applications are also now open and avail able to all TWAL members and employees of corporate members. These will close on October 31 at 5pm, EDST. Recipients will be announced on November 16.
Several TWAL subcom mittees are being formed and for those interested in the Creating Connections mento ring programme, the subcom mittee chair will be following up and launching a new cam paign in the coming weeks.
Our expression of interest is out for new directors and our AGM will be held on No vember 15. All members are welcome to attend as this is an online zoom meeting and particulars are available from the chair@transportwomen. com.au.
out improved access to the Hume Highway for triples. This needs start and end points for unhooking and ensuring that rest areas have
six and nine members. The NHVR board has only five. The chair of the NHVR, Duncan Gay, and the deputy chair, Julie Russell, both have
profit Women in Trucking Aus tralia was established by female drivers to champion diversity and inclusion in the heavy ve hicle driver workforce through the recognition of women as a critical, competent, credible and largely untapped resource.
strengthening the flow of fe male talent into this male dom inated sector.
AFTER years of discussion and deliberation, the Australian road transport sector now faces a painful reality – critical heavy vehicle driver shortages.
In the rich tapestry that is the Australian road transport sector – who are Women in Trucking Australia (WiTA) and what is the organisation’s strate gic focus?
When it comes to female interest in trucking as a ca reer, ambition and enthusiasm abound. We know women want to join the nation’s heavy vehicle driver workforce. We know through lived experience that gender bias continues to stand as the defining barrier - ensuring too many simply don’t get across the line. We also know there is still much work to be done.
Set to move into its fourth year of operations - not-for-
Facebook analytics in the 28 days to October 31 show the gender distribution of WiTA followers at 43 per cent female and 55 per cent male - a clear indication of the interest Aus tralian women have in trucking as a career. These figures are even more telling, given the stark reality that female drivers comprise less than 2 per cent of the current truck driver cohort.
Like any organisation WiTA is only as good as the sum of its parts, and those parts just happen to be an extremely dedicated, professional group of like-minded directors - in cluding five experienced MC drivers, a CPA/CA and an IT specialist.
Together, the WiTA board works to ensure the implemen tation of integrated corporate governance and management systems that continuously identify, prioritise and se quence the organisation’s most strategic issues with a focus on
In early October, WiTA was delighted to be named one of just 15 grantees nationally to receive funding through the NHVR as part of the Federal Government’s $3.5 million in vestment towards heavy vehicle safety projects.
WiTA’s pilot Foot in the Door program – scheduled to commence in the first quarter of 2023 - will bridge the licence to employment gap by engag ing with industry stakeholders nationally to link already li cenced, inexperienced female HR/HC/MC drivers who’ve NOT been able to get that critical ‘foot in the door’ with training organisations and em ployers nationally.
It is anticipated that success ful applicants will have access to up to $5000 to be used in conjunction with state and fed eral government subsidies to get up to 70 women over the line into sustainable trucking careers.
Applications for the Foot in the Door program will open early November, with details available on the WiTA Face book page.
The timing of this critical pilot project is perfect - with green shoots appearing in dustry-wide as women report trucking companies now tak ing the issue of gender equity seriously. WiTA’s diversity is its strength and thanks to the
commitment and efforts of so many, the organisation has a strong heartbeat.
As we embark on our fourth operational year with enthu siasm and optimism, we will continue to elevate the voic es of female drivers – most of
whom fly under the radarsharing their unique stories to shift the conversation around gender diversity and inclusion and to establish an entity des tined to become the peak body representing Australian female heavy vehicle drivers.
WOMEN IN TRUCKING
LYNDAL DENNY
THE transport industry is in unanimous agreement on how we can make road trans port safer, fairer and sustain able.
Other industry bodies have joined the Transport Work ers Union, including clients, employer associations and gig economy companies in calling for a level playing field.
The voice was loud enough that Workplace Re lations Minister Tony Burke announced the Federal Gov ernment’s intention to em power the Fair Work Com mission (FWC) to set fair standards for the entire trans port industry.
Under this proposal, the FWC would be tasked with making transport a more sus tainable industry for all.
That is good news for owner-drivers who will be given greater strength to seek
fairness and cost recovery of doing the job.
It also means that in the face of disputes, there will be access to dispute resolution that means driver voices can be heard.
It’s time. The TWU has had enough of owner-drivers being forced to carry the costs of doing business for wealthy supply chain clients.
There is an urgent need for supply chain accountability to ensure cost recovery does not become a struggle for small business transport op erators, whether those costs be Transurban toll roads, the cost of fuel or more.
This need for reform was highlighted with the kick in the teeth provided by Toll Group to their owner oper
ators, who cart groceries for Woolworths.
In September, as diesel costs increased, owner- oper ators driving out of the Wool worths DC in Minchinbury took their cost pressure con cerns to Sydney Toll Group general manager, Steve Innes.
Toll is providing only 10 cents extra a pallet. Toll’s idea of cost relief is worth around
1 litre of diesel at today’s pric es per 22 pallets on a single trailer.
It covers the first two ki lometres of a driver’s trip. It is even less than the cost of a litre of milk sold at Wool worths. We will speak with members to determine which way forward to be able to re solve this matter.
Now is the time for the
transport industry to get to gether behind solutions that mean a fair way forward.
It is about acknowledging and implementing recom mendations that were sug gested by all in the industry in the Senator Sterle Inquiry into road transport.
Transport workers can have a seat at the table, when decisions are being made that
affect the industry, and the work that you do.
Lifesaving, industry re form can be a reality, we need your voice, we need to continue to work together to save truck business and truck driver lives.
Our plan is to make this happen; we need all the in dustry to get behind a safer and fairer future for all.
A recurring theme on these pages from myself and oth er transport industry groups in recent times has been the challenges of chronic labour shortages and their impact on already stressed supply chains, and the operators tasked with keeping them functioning.
The pandemic exposed just how vulnerable the whole country is to worker shortages. For two years, border closures and mandatory isolation for anyone with Covid and their close contacts put pressure on service delivery right across the country. And despite borders opening, and pretty much every Covid restriction abolished, the lag effect means it will take time to catch up and for our labour supply to keep pace with demand.
For the freight industry, this of course is nothing new.
Ours is an industry that has grappled with labour short ages long before Covid-19 arrived in Australia because of a combination of an aging workforce and the challenges we have long faced of attract ing new people to work in freight and logistics.
The structural problem of solving the problem from a long-term perspective, and to start to reverse the age pro file of heavy vehicle drivers, is being tackled by the VTA and other industry groups in a number of ways.
Firstly, our licencing sys
tem in Victoria and elsewhere is old and antiquated and in appropriate for the transport industry in the 21st century. It rewards experience over qual ifications and must be over hauled to attract young, high ly trained people to long-term careers in transport.
The VTA is leading advo cacy for this reform. We want to see 18-years-olds behind the wheel of heavy vehicles, but only after receiving compre hensive practical training and instruction, thus putting them on a career path to a satisfying and financially rewarding pro fession as a driver. The days of transport work being just a job are over, and as an industry we
must portray driving and oth er transport work for what it is – a profession.
The Victorian Govern ment is recognising the value of more comprehensive train ing through its support of a number of VTA programs.
Our Driver Delivery pro gram provides eight days of hands-on instruction and has placed hundreds of new skilled drivers in transport roles since it commenced around four years ago. More recently, the Freight Industry Training for Jobseekers Project is providing direct pathways for women to fill 125 freight and logistics roles through VTA-sponsored heavy vehicle, forklift and
warehousing training, fol lowed by job placement and support.
The evolution of these pro grams must be reformation of the heavy vehicle driver licencing system to prioritise qualifications and training, which we will fiercely contin ue to advocate. This structural reform will take time, so in the interim we need creative solu tions to attract qualified heavy vehicle drivers.
One such solution the VTA has been pushing is for the Commonwealth Government to add heavy vehicle driver to Australia’s Priority Migration Skilled Occupation List.
Recently, the National Skills Commission published its 2022 Skills Priority List, with “truck driver (general)” included as one of 129 occu pations that weren’t consid ered to be in shortage is 2021, but apparently now is.
The list simply confirms what everybody in transport
has been saying for years about driver shortages– that truck driver (general) has been added to the list won’t change a thing.
For Australia to attract competent and qualified heavy vehicle drivers from overseas in the short-term, we need to change our skilled mi gration program to prioritise this occupation over others. Absent is the understanding by the statutory road bodies in every state of the value of this classification.
For example, the National Skills Commission Key Find ings Report confirmed occu pation shortages were most acute in Professional and Skill Level Category 3 occupations among Technicians and Trade Workers. Heavy Vehicle Driv er is a Skill level category 4 oc cupation and does not thereby qualify for direct migration and Visa support.
Re-categorising heavy ve hicle driving as a Skill Lev
el Category 3 occupation would give qualified, profes sional overseas drivers that are considering re-locating to Australia permanently or temporarily, a deserved ad vantage over people in other occupations where there ar en’t chronic shortages.
Our immigration rules need to change to support the Australia economy and peo ple. We cannot even compete with other countries that have recognised the skill of a heavy vehicle driver such as US, Canada and the UK.
As we struggle to recover from the pandemic and the longer-term issues around labour supply our industry remains disenfranchised with bureaucracy which is slow to react. There are solutions and outcomes that would bring welcome positive reform to our industry and a simple re classification of a migration standard would be a strong first step.
BORN and bred on a cattle station near Alice Springs, William Rosie, 48, says truck driving is in his blood.
“I was forced into it at a very young age. I used to jump into the old Macks and Kenworths to pull the stock crates. I would travel in the back of the truck when I was about five years old, and by 15 I was out driving on my own,” he said.
“The first time I jumped in the truck by myself, I had to get three single decks of cattle to Alice Springs be cause one of the drivers had their appendix burst. I was only 15. The coppas saw me driving all the time and they knew I didn’t have a licence. I was a bit of a rebel back then.”
Rosie said he was taught to drive a truck by his father, along with the other truck drivers he was surrounded by growing up. “I took a lot of information on board over the years as I was really keen. It was a challenge and I was up for it,” he said.
“Back then, it was all hard yakka. The biggest problem we have in today’s society is that the trucks have gotten bigger, better and flashier, with a lot more expenses,
but the mentality of many new drivers today if differ ent, they don’t see things the way we do. We were always taught to respect the gear. Today many just see it as a high paying job. But it’s one of the most dangerous jobs anyone could do.”
Rosie grew up in the NT before moving to Queensland with his family when he was about 16, after they sold the cattle station. He helped his father cart grain and gained valuable tipper experience. Then at 20, Rosie bought his first truck.
These days, he lives in Perth, which he’s called home
for the past decade.
Rosie has worked for VPL Transport for the past five years. The Perth-based com pany started seven years ago but has grown very quickly. From six trucks, they’ve now got 26.
You’ll find Rosie behind the wheel of the newest truck in the fleet, a 2020 Kenworth T909, which he uses to pull triple road trains right across the state. “It had 6000 kilo metres on the clock when I got it, 12 months later it has 306,000 kilometres on it.”
He usually carts gener al, oversize and machinery. “The company I work for is
brilliant, I love it. They are relaxed and down to earth, but if something isn’t right, they’ll let you know. If you need a dangerous goods li cence, or need to do a load restraint course, they’ll also pay for you to get it done, which a lot of other places won’t do. The more you do for the company and the more you look after your gear, the more they’ll reward you. They’re very fair.”
From livestock, tank ers, refrigerated and floats, throughout his career, Rosie has done it all. “That’s prob ably why I’ve got the knowl edge I have today. For the
first 10 years of my career, I had my own business, and if someone asked me to do something, I’d say show me what to do and I’ll do it. I am big but I do not and will not tolerate laziness.
“I’ve worked for big com panies and for little compa nies over the years, but the
hardest thing I ever did was selling up and going back to working for someone else af ter working for myself for 10 years. It was hard because I had to comprehend the way they wanted things done,” he explained.
“A lot of people today tend to go the other way,
where the company has to try and carry them because they’re not pulling their weight. I try and explain to people that it’s a privilege to do what we’re doing – to go down the road with millions
on, it’s up to us to ensure the security of the vehicle be cause if we get broken into, we’re the first ones to be cru cified.”
Through his many years in the industry, Rosie has
and insurance companies have a lot to answer to with why we have driver shortages today. If they let us do things the way we used to do it, we wouldn’t have the issues we have today. While this keeps
highways. Make your own haul road like they did in the Tanami if you’re going to put inexperienced operators on there. It’s just getting too dangerous. And if you can’t reverse, you shouldn’t be do ing the job, because if you get yourself into a predicament, you can’t get yourself out of it.”
Over the years, Rosie has taught many young drivers
bay and he’s keen as mustard. He wants to get into the in dustry and wants to learn properly. My advice was to go around town and do the rigids, then get into the dog trailers up the hill, and then when you get more confi dent, travel with someone like myself. We’ll make sure you learn the right way.
“I think it’s a great job and a lot of people should do it,
the job, this is my legacy. I learnt to do this job for a rea son. What really drives me is knowing I can go up the road and have that little bit of free dom. When I’m on the road I have so much time to think.
“But it’s very hard on fam ily life too. I never settled down until five years ago when I had a wife. It only lasted that long because of the fact that she enjoyed me
“Even at my age, one thing I do regret is not having kids, because they would have been damn good operators. I taught my sister, she does Adelaide to Darwin. As soon as she leaves that job I’ve told her there’s a job right here waiting for her. She’s only 5 foot 2 but she’s hard as nails
YOUNGER truckie Jeff An ders opted to speak about the positive side of what the road transport industry has provid ed for him when we met in the tropics earlier this month.
It was just before dusk and Anders, 34, was having a fa tigue break whilst parked at the BP Cluden Roadhouse on
the outskirts of Townsville.
“The variety in the job is great and I just love it. Every day I get to see parts of Aus tralia and many I haven’t been to before. Weekly it is a dif ferent route and I get paid for it,” he said.
Anders was driving a Ken worth K200 for Brisbane
based Chess Moving and gets around to many areas.
“I have been a truckie most of my working life and car ried furniture for most of that. Couldn’t think of doing any thing else,” he said.
Enthusiastic Anders said he also liked stopping at BP Cluden when in the area, for various reasons.
“The food is good, the showers and toilets are clean, staff are friendly and there’s lots of parking,” he said.
Location is another reason Anders stops at the huge road house which is across from Cluden racecourse and anoth er attraction.
“There is a shopping centre a short walk across a paddock from here with supermarkets, cafes, and lots of specialty shops,” he said.
What Anders didn’t men tion, because he probably didn’t know about it, was the saltwater creek about 150m from where he was parked.
Truckies on similar breaks have been known to catch a barramundi or two and the odd mud crab from its waters using a fishing line or fold up pot carried in their truck.
Anders said there were “more and more rest areas pop ping up” around Aus, which was good for people like him.
He is a Brisbane Broncos NRL supporter and the first truck he drove was an old Ken worth.
As for his favourite stop off other than a roadhouse, Anders quickly nominated the Blue Heeler Hotel in the Queensland outback.
“Another place where the people are very friendly and makes you want to go back there,” he said.
I used to travel there an nually back in the nineties to cover the famous “outback surf carnival on a dry creek bed.”
Lots of traveling truckies were amongst the guests who would stop there as well as
hundreds of genuine charac ters, and funds raised went to the Royal Flying Doctor Ser vice.
Anders said Chess Moving has seven other prime movers and will travel anywhere, de livering and picking up fur niture for businesses, private people or government.
Anders works alongside Craig Deas, who was also trav elling in the cab, helping to move furniture from Brisbane to Mount Isa, Townsville and Roma.
Deas, 45, is currently train ing to be a truck driver and has been impressed by the comfort of the 2021 Kenworth K200
JEFF ANDERS
the pair get to travel in.
“It’s a very comfortable tuck, and I like the freedom on the road and all the places I get
THE VARIETY IN THE JOB IS GREAT AND I JUST LOVE IT. EVERY DAY I GET TO SEE PARTS OF AUSTRALIA AND MANY I HAVEN’T BEEN TO BEFORE. WEEKLY IT IS A DIFFERENT ROUTE AND I GET PAID FOR IT.”
to see and the different people I meet,” he said.
In his trips so far Deas has found the Flinders Highway between Townsville and Clon curry as a road that’s difficult to get along.
But he does reckon there are more than enough rest ar eas for truckies spread across
Queensland.
“When we are tired we just pull up at one and go to sleep, so yes,” he said.
Deas intends learning about the trucking industry and is training for his truck licence so he can fulfill his life time dream to get behind the wheel.
VETERAN truckie Adam Hawks, 58, had transported cotton from a Northern Terri tory property to Dalby when I saw him recently.
He drives a Kenworth C509 for Nighthawk Transport and was picking up a back load of fertiliser from North Queensland, bound for Dar win.
“It is a great job I do and I get to meet lots of different people daily. I have been a truck driver for 30 years,” he said.
On his trips Hawks likes stopping at the Dunmarra Roadhouse in NT which he sings the praises of loudly.
Another favourite is the Blue Heeler Hotel at Kynuna along the Cloncurry to Winton road.
The Kenworth is powered by a 600hp motor with an 18 speed Roadranger gearbox and Hawks loves it.
One of the worst highways
he has to negotiate is between Roma and Mount Isa. I also asked him if there are enough rest areas. “I think so at the mo ment,” he said.
His hobby is weight board ing or skiing, and he barracks for the Cowboys during NRL season.
Hawks lives happily on a
with Alf Wilsonproperty between Brisbane and Warwick and, like the rest of us, enjoys his food. “My fa vourite meal is rump steak and vegies,” he said.
THIS article is the ending of an era for the transport industry with the demise of this magazine under the restructure and rationalisation of News Corp
It is a sad day for all of us in the industry as Big Rigs magazine has been a part of our lives for almost 30 years.
For some, their entire careers so far.
It will leave huge gap as the editors and staff have supported the industry, provided fair and rational debate and given everyone a fair say in industry doings to all, as well as stories, pictures and news of our people, our trucks and our unsung heroes.
Our lives will be the poorer for its demise; being a columnist for Big Rigs for the past year and half has allowed me to fulfil yet another childhood dream, to write, and it has given me great pleasure and I hope it has at least been enjoyed by some.
While so many are focused on the negatives of the industry, I have tried to focus on the
positives aspects or those issues about which I am most passionate and have a chance of making a contribution to change.
I began writing column when I was returned as Transport Women Australia Limited chair in November 2017.
In the interim, TWAL has had many successes and achievements.
It has expanded the relationship with Girl Guides Australia and been involved with several successful projects with them, the Victorian Snoozefest
We launched the
in Melbourne.
In November 2019 we celebrated the 20th Anniversary of the organisation (TWAL) with a fabulous gala dinner at The Windsor Melbourne where we also presented our first four winners of the Driving the Difference scholarships with our amazing sponsor, Daimler Truck and Bus Asia Pacific.
We also presented the inaugural Trish Pickering Mem-
orial Award, sponsored by the wonderful Wes Pickering.
This was awarded for longterm outstanding contribution by a female to the road transport industry, the inaugural winner was Pam McMillan the longest serving director and chair of Transport Women Australia Limited.
This is an annual award and the recipient of the 2020 Trish Pickering Memorial Award
describes matters of public interest (7)
a metal urn used for heating water (7)
is a childhood desease characterised by softening of the bones (7)
artless
will be announced later this year at an event still to be determined.
We have also launched our Learning Initiatives Breakfast Series with several partners so far, including NTI, MOVE BANK and rt health.
In early 2020 the Creating Connections Mentoring program was finally ready to commence with both mentors and mentees signing up to the pro-
gram.
I would like to thank the fantastic team at Big Rigs newspaper for their incredible support and wish them ongoing success.
I hope that I get the opportunity to continue to work with some of them and so work towards making the trucking industry a better appreciated, and a safer place for our people.
long way to go – we have been through countless road, freight and transport ministers and nothing changes.
Truck drivers are still dying at work.
It’s a pretty safe bet to say this is due to the lack of strong government policy in place,
policy that should be keeping safe one of the most dangerous industries in Australia.
To quote one truck driver turned Australian senator, Glenn Sterle, “a death at work or on the road should not be the price of doing business”.
The TWU puts it to governments that we must stop the inequality that exists between truck drivers and clients.
Drivers must be paid proper rates, owner-drivers must be able to trust they will be paid properly for the work they do and on time. Families depend on this.
Many of the ongoing problems that occur are down to the big clients squeezing our
industry as dry as they can.
They want operators to meet their unrealistic deadlines and take on more freight for less or they face the risk of
losing their contracts and the ability to support their families.
It appears the government does not care.
There are unsafe vehicles, dodgy licences, poor payment times, wage and superannuation theft – just a few of the many things we have called for to be stopped.
A reminder to governments and the transport industry clients: the industry that has kept Australia moving during the pandemic is facing an uphill battle.
Employer groups should be standing alongside transport workers to unite for a safer and fairer industry.
A final reminder to all Big Rigs readers: now is the time to unite, now is the time to ensure equality in this industry.
Together we can stand on common ground working to ensure the government continues to support transport workers and the industry they support.
The TWU will continue to voice the needs of transport workers to the employers, their industry bodies and the clients.
Better standards mean job security and ultimately a safer and fairer industry for all.
We can lift the standards we need together – our lives depend on it.
MODERN technology and the internet deliver the oppor tunity for listener- focussed broadcaster Australian Truck Radio to be ideally positioned for the captive niche market of Australian trucking. Founder and manager Simon Smith recognises the need for a con nection to trucking communi ty, and also the responsibilities which come with it.
“They’re a huge mobile community and they are look ing for their own station, and now we have to technology and re sources to provide that nation ally 24/7. The mobile phone is
today’s radio transmitter and receiver,” said Smith, a
veteran of radio broadcast ing who initiated the successful ‘truckers’ radio’ format at sev eral stations in southern NSW during the late 1980s, mostly on the midnight to dawn shift.
An unexpected bonus after the original show had been on air for a time was an anecdot al reduction in fatigue-related accidents involving heavy ve hicles in the areas where the broadcasts were being received.
The consolidation of com mercial radio networks in Aus tralia during the past few de cades has led to focus shifting
from categories such as truck ing as more stations chose to concentrate on specific con sumer groups such as young homeowners or even attempt to be all things to all listeners while ultimately only satisfy ing the overall listening needs of a few.
Australian trucking is a huge mobile community look ing for industry specific news and information and the driv ers are at the same time looking for a radio station they can lock on and leave on while they are occupying their cabs and lis tening to the information and entertainment which apply to
their own work activities as well as their often unique lifestyles.
“If you’ve got a radio station and you’re trying to be every thing to everybody it’s not go ing to work,” said Smith. “We provide something that peo ple want with a music-driven format, and in between the songs we can have a bit of a laugh and a bit of variety in cluding regular on-air conver sations with industry people.”
“The trucking industry has changed,” Smith points out. “It’s mostly dual carriage way between capital cities such as Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.
“In the past, drivers would pull up at a roadhouse and sit around and have a meal togeth er, but now with the dual car riageways, that opportunity for camaraderie is no longer there.
“We want to provide a ra dio station that’s like a truck ies’ campfire where they can sit around and talk and listen.”
Smith says Australian Truck Radio, dubbed the ‘voice of Australian trucking’ can be heard simply by downloading the designated Radio Station app (scan the bar code on this page) or on a computer at the website truckradio.au.
“The mobile phone is to
day’s radio transmitter. You can download the app straight onto your mobile plus you can of course listen online from our Australian Truck Radio web site,” he adds.
“The Australian Truck Ra dio program format is designed to be a radio station truckies around Australia can lock onto 24/7.
“There’s loads of trucking classics every hour with heaps of handy industry news and information plus lots more all day, every day.”
Music can range from any where between Slim Dusty and Lee Kernaghan, to Jimmy Barnes, Midnight Oil, INXS, and Bruce Springsteen.
“It’s a jukebox for truckies that goes everywhere you do,” said Smith.
“The trucking industry is the biggest niche market in Australian radio and this huge mobile community deserves to have their own 24/7 radio sta tion – now they do.”
“WE WANT TO PROVIDE A RADIO STATION THAT’S LIKE A TRUCKIES’ CAMPFIRE WHERE THEY CAN SIT AROUND AND TALK AND LISTEN.”
SIMON SMITH
ALTHOUGH he has no fam ily connection with trucking, Caleb Austin-Gell was sold on a career as a truckie from the moment he spotted his first road train, and sat transfixed by every trucking show on TV.
So dedicated to his endgoal was Austin-Gell that while still at school he’d often work up until 2-3am at his first job for a furniture removal company in Wacol, go to class, return again for the afternoon shifts, before coming back for more in the weekends.
“I originally got my MR licence because I just wanted to basically get into driving as soon as possible and the only vehicles that were at my other company were MR-rated ve hicles,” said Austin-Gell, now 20.
“As soon as I was eligible to get my HC, I went straight for it.”
But because of his age at the time – 19 – no one was willing to give Austin-Gell his big break.
“I started applying for sev
eral different companies and every company came back with the same response: be cause of my age they can’t hire me, or they won’t let me drive.
“Blenners was the only company to come back with a positive note to inform me that they were able to give me a chance.”
Austin-Gel started with Blenners at its busy Brisbane depot on August 23, and it’s been a dream come true in ev ery way.
While working for the furniture removal company he’d do a lot of driving up to Cairns, and all along that route all he kept seeing was the big, bright new shiny rigs with the distinctive Blenners Transport yellow livery.
“It’s always been my dream to not only drive for a big company, but also drive Ken worths, K200s, or T909s,” he said.
“I could see that Blenners looked after their equipment, and I wanted to work for a company that looked after their equipment and their workers as well.”
With no experience at all in the world of refrigerated trans port, he admits that his first days at Blenners was a step learning curve.
But Blenners teamed him up with experienced local driver Richard Brew to help Austin-Gell learn the ropes.
“He was super helpful with learning – and also extreme ly funny – and it was just a friendly environment,” said Austin-Gell.
“You learn from your mis takes but at the same time the guys are there to help you.”
By day four of the train ing partnership, Austin-Gell was feeling confident of going solo, but was more than happy to keep the training wheels on for the full week.
“I wanted to make sure that I knew everything because once you’re out there, not only are you driving vehicles but you’re also looking after peo ple’s food.
“So, I wanted to make sure I could do it all properly and do it all right.”
With the training wheels well and truly discarded, Aus
tin-Gell is now driving solo in a road ranger Kenworth T350, which he asked for in order to get more experience in a man ual under his belt.
“The other company I was with would always put me in an auto, but I don’t learn much more by doing that than what I already know.
“I want to go that one step bigger so in the next coming months I’ll be soon doing more training so hopefully at the start of next year I’ll up grade to my MC.”
Austin-Gell says he was more than happy to take the P-plater pathway too.
“I’m not one to wait. I don’t like waiting. As soon as I can go for something, I’ll go for it.
“When I heard that I was eligible to get my rigid licence and then eligible to get my HC, all whilst I’m on my green Ps, it really motivated.
“The look on people’s faces when they see a green P-plat er driving a semi, it makes me happy because it can show that the young generation can still drive trucks, if you’re re sponsible, obviously.”
David Mackay, Blenners Brisbane-based training and recruitment officer, was con fident that Austin-Gell would be an invaluable addition to the driving roster, once he got the sign-off from Blenners di rector Les Blennerhassett.
“Les gave us the benefit of the doubt. He said, ‘Let’s give it a go, I just need a report on how it went, and he needs to be with a more senior driver for a few days so we can ob
serve his driving attributes, as well as getting his inductions into the different processes that we do, and the various locations where we deliver’.”
A few days later, Mackay was thrilled to report back to Blennerhassett how successful his punt was on the new re cruit.
“Caleb successfully deliv ered and received from the following locations: Lineage, ALM, Pacific National Rail Head, Coles, Woolworths, to name a few,” Mackay wrote in his report.
“He does not shy away from difficult delivery loca tions and enjoys the chal lenge.
“Caleb has shown ma turity beyond his years, a dedication to his duties and represents the business with a professional persona. I have discussed with him; future plans and he is looking for long term employment with Blenners Transport and is very appreciate of the opportunity.
“I highly recommend Ca leb as a Blenners Transport team member.”
In the same report to Blen nerhassett, Brisbane-based HR manager Rachel Mon tague-Thompson also praised
the initiative and hopes the successful on-boarding of Austin-Gell into the Blenners team can pave the way for oth er youngsters to follow.
She says a young mechan ic in the Blenners workshop, whose dad is a driver, has also now put his hand up to drive as well.
“It’s really refreshing to see because we know what’s happening with the number of jobs that are available to the number of people that are available,” said Mon
tague-Thompson.
“The industry is not what it used to be; we do have to think differently.
“This shows the industry that it can be done.
“All it took was for Caleb to be with a driver for five or six days.”
Montague-Thompson says she can understand some companies’ hesitancy in taking on younger drivers, both on the score of the insurance con cerns and the fear some may even jump ship to rivals after
receiving training.
“But if you start looking a little bit differently and put in the time and investment now, it’s got to be a positive in the long run.
“Behaviour breeds be haviour. We bring people in, they see that we take pride in our trucks, they see that we take pride in doing certain things, then people will add to the culture and that becomes infectious.”
Austin-Gell, who has since graduated from the P-plate to
his open licence, is hoping his story and big break with Blen ners will inspire other young sters to follow his example.
“Don’t hold back,” is the message he wants to convey as he counts down the clock on his six-month probation and what he hopes will now be a long-term driving role with Blenners Transport.
“If you have a dream, go for it,” he said.
“It doesn’t matter how young you are, just do you, and go for it.”
Young driver Caleb Austin-Gell, 20, is living the dream doing local Brisbane runs as he works his way up the ranks at Blenners Transport.
