When Carl Kirkbeck caught up with Tony McCall at the new Scania Lorneville facility, Tony was just finishing up having a little service work completed on the 2022 650S he pilots for Canterbury Plains Transport of Rangiora. Tony, himself a resident of Rangiora, has been with the CPT team for a touch over 18 years now.
“I started on a 2005 540 Merc, then moved across to a 555 Merc. A bit later I grabbed the opportunity to jump into a 620 Scania that worked out of the Banks Peninsula when it came available. It was really well specced for the job. A short wheelbase made it extremely manoeuvrable. I ended up putting just over a 1,000,000km on that one.
“I got offered a couple of new Mercs, but I was happy to stay in the old Scania. One morning I came into the yard and here was the Scania rep to take the order for a replacement, so here I am now with a bit over a year behind the wheel of this one.”
Tony started out working in the freezing works, then did a stint at a sawmill and some time on the family farm working for his dad, but it was an offer to drive a fert spreader for Souness Brothers Transport of Clydevale that saw Tony transition into the driver’s seat in 1992.
“It just railroaded from there. I did two years on that, then moved across to Clutha Valley for four to five years, but it was stock work that I wanted to do. A job with Frew’s at Oxford finally got me onto the stock work. From there, I moved across to Greta Valley Transport, and in around 2006, this position at CPT became available, and I grabbed it.
“For me, I love working with the stock and operating big machinery, a result of being brought up on a farm. This work combines those two passions for me. My pet hate of the job would have to be farmers that don’t empty out their stock. They don’t take the time to organise themselves and have the stock presented and prepared ready for transporting.
Tony’s vexing question was Ford or Holden, to which he pulled out his phone to show us a picture of his very tidy FG Falcon XR8 ute, as well as a couple of classic Valiants, so yes, it is definitely the blue oval, with a dash of Hemi for good measure.
