Matt Lumby was born in Wodonga but has lived in Rutherglen his whole life. He grew up on a farm 15 kilometres out of Rutherglen and undertook all of his schooling at Rutherglen primary and high school.
What do you do workwise?
I am a carpenter and completed my apprenticeship with a local commercial builder. Since then, I worked for another local domestic builder where I finetuned my skills for the last five years. At the start of this year, I took the leap to go out on my own and am subcontracting around the area and building up my own business from the ground up.
What brought you to your role/career?
Growing up on the farm I loved being hands-on from building tree houses to general work on the farm and always something to fix with Dad and Pa, I knew from a young age that I wanted to be a builder.
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What do you love about your work?
I love working outdoors. I get to be creative with planning and transforming an idea into action. Nothing beats the look on the client’s face when they first get to see their dream/ideas come to life.
What do you do in the community?
Other than helping dad when I was younger with his multiple roles in the community, I was involved in the Corowa/Rutherglen hockey club but have had time away from the game. I’m sure in the next few years I will be involved in the hockey club again as our daughter grows up and begins playing sport.
Is there an important community issue that you think needs addressing?
I think an important issue is getting young kids outside more and off technology. I think a great community initiative like Boys to the Bush has helped many young males so something out there for the young females would be great. Also, high schools need to push for kids to pursue a career in the trades as we need more tradies.
Something that has worked very well in the past is work experiences where the kids can work one day a week throughout their senior years to find out what they want to do and get a head start.
What do you see as one of the most important regional issues?
The increase in tradies tool trailers and utes getting broken into and tools stolen in our regional areas is getting out of hand. It used to be mainly in our major cities, but our regional areas are also getting very bad. I personally had my tool trailer stolen that wiped out my tools a couple years ago. I feel that there needs to be bigger punishments for those who get caught.
If the person you would most like to meet came to Indigo Shire (past or present), or was already here, who would that be, what would you show them, and why?
Luke Hodge, an ex-Hawthorn AFL player would be someone I would like to meet. I would show him the fantastic local sporting facilities that we have in Rutherglen and have him speak to the local footballers about his experiences and time as an AFL footballer.
What book are you reading?
I don’t really read books a whole lot unless one classes reading a night time story to my two-year-old. Her couple of favourites at the moment are Hairy Maclary from Donaldsons Dairy and Spots Adventures.
