Goodaye all. Last night I accompanied my daughter Katie and her partner Luke, to the Transport Women Australia Limited (TWAL) 20th Anniversary Gala Dinner in Melbourne. TWAL through their sponsorship from Daimler, have four scholarships available to help people improve their knowledge or advance their transport career. TWAL made other awards including the inaugural Pickering Memorial Award to Pam McMillan, for her over 18 years involvement with the group.
The four winners came from 4 different states and each has a different course or aim and my daughter Katie was one of the four winners. Katie aims to do a Certificate 4 in Transport and Logistics and her employer will also contribute to the course cost. The “Driving the Difference Scholarships” will help those achieve more I am sure. To my knowledge, these are the only scholarships of this type available to those within the transport industry and I would like to thank and congratulate Daimler and TWAL for the initiative.
Many other companies support TWAL, some like PACCAR, Cummins and Teletrac-Navman are also supporters of the TRUCKRIGHT Industry Vehicle and without all those supporters, TWAL would not be able to work to encourage women into trucking. How many other groups go the extra mile to get young women in? There is a group in the USA as well and much like everything there, it is much bigger, but to all who have been involved here with TWAL since its inception, all involved now and those women who want to help and participate, even if only through being a member and doing their bit to improve things for all, I would heartily recommend you consider joining TWAL. Men can join as well to support and contribute and we need good young people to get involved.
One hundred and eighty-eight attended the dinner and it was well run and organised, congratulations to all involved. It is not often I get the chance to meet with those outside of drivers and yet, many of the conversations I took part in, centred on the other aspects and careers in the industry which are often over-looked. I was at the table with the four winners and each has a role that has given them a chance to contribute their skills and passion to an industry many love and enjoy.
I spoke with the four winners and hope they all do well in their careers. We have little positives in many ways in our industry as too often we only seem to attract the bad press and this is certainly one of those positives, an association of women helping others get involved in transport. Well done.
Many asked how I got there and thanks as always to Rod Pilon Transport for helping. I took a load down, did some rearranging Saturday before heading off to the dinner and have spent today taking it easy, though I have cleaned out the trailer toolboxes and caught up on some TV. I have a couple of drops to do in the morning and hope to get a couple of things looked at on the TIV before loading out tomorrow afternoon.
I had two incidents during the week, one a truck with overheating brakes that drew much comment on the UHF and another where a fellow said he did not see all the signs at roadworks. Thankfully he just overshot the queued traffic but copped an earful again on the radio. It could have been much worse, and both go to show, you can’t not watch and or be aware of what you are doing.
None of us are perfect, but one of those incidents could be lousy or no training, getting a license when that alone is not enough for you to survive on the roads and the other a lack of or loss of concentration. Either could have become a major crash or cost a life. How do we change that? How do we ensure that drivers know what is required and keep doing it? If you can answer that, you will make a difference.
Applications are open again for NHVR Heavy Vehicle Safety projects and if you have a safety idea, if you think you have the solution to a road safety problem, then make an effort to put in a submission. You may save a life or many, but that won’t happen if we all sit back and do nothing and expect others to do it for us. Safe Travelling, Rod Hannifey.
TRUCKRIGHT 