A journey through time with Tony Moretti: celebrating a 50-year career

Chatting with Tony, you quickly learn he has a knack for dates, a deep love for his family and his Falcon, and enjoys a good conversation.

Tony has shared some of his journey, celebrating his 50-year career and revealing a consistent thread of practicality and positivity throughout his time.

My family comes from Calabria in the southern part of Italy.

In 1954 my father came over to Australia and Mum joined him in August 1956.

So the story goes, straight off the boat, straight to church, first child 9 months later – me. My brothers were born a few years later and we moved from Melbourne to Nangwarry to Tantanoola to Mount Gambier and, we’ve been here ever since.

Our family has always been in the timber industry. My parents worked in the pines, my uncle used to have a logging company, one of my brothers is a forwarder operator, and my other brother was involved too.

My story is this – I left school when I was 16 and started in Woods and Forests as an apprentice motor mechanic on January 28^th 1973.  

I did my four years, and I would have stayed but the rules changed so as soon as you qualified, you left the Department. I qualified and went to work for my uncle for a couple of years as a mechanic driver.

I came back in 1979. I walked into the power station and said to the boss – “I’m looking for a job, are you looking for people?”

They were, and I started February 7^th.

I was at the power station for 30 years, where I moved through to shift supervisor and spent some time in management.

In 2009 I switched to despatch and eventually made my way over to the weighbridge.

Over my time I’ve been a motor mechanic, boiler attendant, engine driver, in charge of the turbines, despatch clerk, and security. In all the years I’ve been here I’ve seen a lot of change – everything is computerised, and it’s all so much safer.

Now that I’m older, I’ve loved the move out to the weighbridge, it gave me a chance to learn new skills, proving that you are never too old to learn.

The gist of it is weighing the trucks…and that’s it! There’s no set schedule, the trucks come when they can, between 6am and about 10pm.

It was an adjustment learning how to use the computers, but there’s no challenge in the job that I can’t take on.

The best part for me is interacting with the drivers and getting to know them. Our typical interactions are only a few minutes, but you can get a lot from those chats, talking about your families, and really get to know people over time.

My advice for people earlier on in their career is ask, listen, learn, and adapt.

That’s what I’ve done. If you’re not sure about something, ask. Even if you think it sounds like a silly question, you’ll eventually get an answer.

The other thing I’ve picked up is how to teach people. Some people like to learn theory and some people are hands on. It’s about getting to know their style, and being patient.

Back to how it all started for my career, I’ve had an interest in cars since before I started my mechanic apprenticeship. I’m now in the SE Street Machines club with my BF Falcon GT – it’s my pride and joy. My dream car though is a bit out of budget – a Lamborghini Countach, at over $300,000…

The highlight of my personal life, I have two girls and one boy, and I just became a grandfather in April.

I’m 67, but I’ll do a couple more years. I’ll wait for my wife to retire too so we can spend time together. I want to stick around for the boiler upgrade as well, it’s exciting. I enjoyed my 30 years in that area so I’d love to see the new upgrade done before I get out of here!