MASTER FARRIERS ASSOCIATION OF NSW. INC. 1906

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New Membership Structure

At the recent MFA meeting it was decided there would be a new membership structure put in place.

As the association is now in a good financial position with the income from race day services the committee decided that we will drop all general membership fees to nil.

All known qualified tradesmen in NSW will be added to the list and will remain members free of charge.If you want your name removed from the list please contact us. If there is some one you know that should be on the list please contact us.

Please check the web site to make sure your details are correct.

We will still offer a premium membership of $330 p/annum for members who wish to attend seminars and the association will cover 50% of the fee

Any apprentice that finishes their time will automatically become a member free of charge

Any new member who upgrade their skills and has a CERT 111 certificate and/or trade  recognition papers ie Craft Certificate a one off joining fee of $330 will apply

We remind members that we are still actively pursueing country race meetings in NSW to service. The association will negotiate with race clubs to ensure the correct fee is being paid .If you are currentley servicing a country race meeting please contact us to make sure you are recieving the correct amount for your service .These race meetings also ensure the financial survival of the association.  

We are confident these measures will help the industry strive towards better self regulation of the farrier industry going forward and in the near future we will have a national registery of all qualified farriers in the country

August 2022

The next meeting will be held on Friday 5th August 2022 at East Court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond at 4.30pm Please contact us if you will be attending for catering purposes 0418254950   

As there has been a lot of confusing information relating to the Farrier course at Hawkesbury TAFE we have organised a meeting with course mamager Rebecca Coventry to explain the current situation at the facility and what to expect moving forward. The meeting will be held in the A Block Conference room A Block is the administration building on campus.All employers of apprentices are strongly encouraged to attend.

Following the TAFE meeting we will be holding the association AGM (see details above)  It is important that you advice us of your attendance as we have to cater for this event.Please text secretary Jim Middleton 0418 254950  

We recentley sponsored the shoeing competition at the Tamworth cutting show to the value of $1500 for the apprentice competition. 

We also awarded $1500 at Hawkesbury TAFE.The apprentice of the year was Tristan McTavish $1000 voucher (apprenticed to James Watt Randwick ) and the winner of the shoeing comp was Robert Grey (apprenticed to Brad Porter) $500 voucher.

The two judges at the TAFE shoeing competition were Mark Colbran and Jim Middleton with president Malcolm Hunt in attendance to award the prizes , the skill and work quality was very good overall and the poiints were very close at the end. All apprentices and employers should be proud of where these young men are at this stage of their careers.

Regards Jim Middleton secretary

May 2022

The next meeting will be held on Tuesday  May 24th 2022 at East Court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond at 6.00pm Please contact us if you will be attending for catering purposes 0418254950   The meeting above will be taking nominations for office for the next financial year.

We have been informed that the Hawkesbury TAFE Farrier course will continue as is. There was concerns that all horse based courses at Hawkesbury would cease in the near future however with some intervention and commion sense the Farrier course will remain. There are still ongoing concerns regarding having two courses and the cost and funding constraints relating to running two coiurses 

As the platform for our website is about to be unsupported we will be changing servers in the near future. As the format of the website has remained largely unchanged the question now is should we leave the format as is or do we change the presentation completley ? We would like some imput from members regarding this issue. We would also ask members to submit new photos for the new website

If you would like to have an input to the new site please send your submissions and or photos to mfansw@mfansw.com.au

The association will be sponsoring two apprentice divisions of the shoeing competition at the Tamworth Cutting Futurity in June 2022.

Due to increased fuel prices recentley we have subsidised all our race day farrier services by $50 each farrier per midweek meetings indefenitley.

The association continues our association with the Inglis Riverside Sale complex at Warwickfarm servicing three sales in the last two months.

Members should be reminded of the apprentice subsidies currentley on offer by state and federal governments.This is an ideal oppurtunity to put on an apprentice

Regards Jim Middleton secretary

March 2022

The next meeting will be held on Thursday  March 24th 2022 at East Court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond at 6.00pm Please contact us if you will be attending for catering purposes 0418254950

With life getting back to somewhere near normal in 2022 (disregarding a potential world war) there should be some events coming up in the near future. Scone horse week is in May and there will be a shoeing competitsion if anyone is interested .The association will be sponsoring the apprentice events.There will be two divisions for apprentices 1-2 second years and 3-4th years.

There has been rumours of Hawkesbury TAFE farrier course discontinuing however this is not true.Some of the horse courses conducted at Hawkesbury may be discontinued however we have not had comformation of this.The TAFE is undergoing a restructure with horse courses as the Scone facility only has two more years as it was purchased by Racing NSW. TAFE will lease back some parts of the Scone campus so we are asuming that both farrier courses will remain or possibley be consolidated into one facility in the futuredepending on the numbers of students.

The association is continuing to service the Inglis sales in 2022 and along with the raceday services which puts us in a healthy financial position moving forward and enables us to have no membership fees 

Regards Jim Middleton secretary 

August 2023

The next meeting will be held on Thursday the 7th of September 2023 at 6pm East court Chinese Restaurant 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond. Please advise if you wish to attend, text Jim Middleton sec 0418254950

As one of our long-term objectives is to consolidate farriers into one association, we are currently in preliminary discussions with the Professional Farriers Association NSW regarding an amalgamation. Even though associations have different priorities we should be able to come to an agreement which will benefit both parties. The aim of all farrier associations should be to have unity and positive directions for the farrier industry as a whole. The industry is currently fragmented which creates confusion for both farriers and the horse owning public. With unity, good management and consistent income streams we can achieve good outcomes for the industry.

There has been reports of apprentices finishing indentureships before their time has been completed. We are not totally sure why this is happening, but it appears apprentices are leaving after they finish their last year of TAFE. If anyone has any information regarding this matter, please contact the association so we can look into it further.

Tasmania Racing has contacted us requesting assistance with certifying farriers. Amando Djuric and Jim Middleton will go to Tasmania at the end of this month to assist TAS Racing. Currently farriers are being certified by a private RTO from South Australia and there have been some conflicting opinions on the outcomes of this process. At least they are moving forward with making the trade more professional.

The committee will stand for. 2023-2024

President Malcolm Hunt

Snr Vice Presidents W Wright K Nicholson

Secretary/Treasurer Jim Middleton

Committee J Watt A Djuric G Morrison

Regards Jim Middleton secretary

JUNE 2023

Hi to everyone. My apologies for the teething problems with the new website as I have had some problems learning how to use the back end so I can add members and new posts.

The next meeting will be held on the 29th June 2023 at 6pm East court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond.

The meeting will be taking nominations for officers for the coming financial year, if there are no new nominations the committee will stand.

The Derek Gardner clinic held at Hawkesbury TAFE had a good attendance and we had 12 members and apprentices who were all subsidised by the association at a cost of $1200

The association once again sponsored the apprentice farrier competitions at the Tamworth Cutting Futurity. The apprentices received vouchers to buy tools. Total value of the sponsorship was $2000

The association has also sponsored Kate Nipperess in her quest to compete with the Australian equestrian team at the Paris Paralympics 2024. Kate was injured in a horrific trackwork fall at Warwickfarm in 2016 which left her wheelchair bound. We will cover the cost of shoeing her horse Cruise and have supplied her with MFA sponsored clothing. We wish her all the best. Kate also has a go fund me page and any help would be greatly appreciated.

Can members please check their details on the website to make sure details are correct. If there is a problem, please let us know by email mfansw@mfansw.com.au as we have ceased the member logins and changes can now only be made by the association.

If members are not receiving text messages please let us know , if there are any farriers who are not on the website and you feel they should be get them to apply on line. Membership is free of charge for any tradesmen who have papers

Regards JIm Middleton secretary

April 2023

The next meeting will be held on Thursday 13th April 2023 at East Court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond at 6pm Please contact us if you will be attending for catering purposes 0418254950   

The current MFA web site platform software will become unsupported in the comming months.We have transfered the website to another provider and changed the look of the site with the same features and buttons.This process should be completed by the end of this week when all the farrier profiles have been exported to the new site.

There is a scheduled teams event in May from the 17th – 20th .This event is being run by the Proffesional Farriers Association at the Willinga Park Gold Buckle Campdraft event on the south coast  .The MFA will be sponsoring the event in the way of gift vouchers for apprentice competitors.If anyone wishes to compete please contact the Proffesional Farriers Association for details.

November 2021

The next meeting will be held on Thursday  18th November  2021 at East Court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond at 6.00pm Please contact us if you will be attending for catering purposes 0418254950

Please note this will be the annual general meeting for 2021.Audited financials will be presented at this meeting before they are handed to the Dept Fair Trading

There has not been a lot happening due to COVID in 2021. We will keep members informed of any news and events as they come to hand

There may be some vacancies servicing metropolitan and some provincial race meetings as some members have or are close to retiring from race meetings. If anyone is interested in applying for these positions please contact us to discuss

Simon Roberts is leaving the Goulburn area in January2022 so if there is anyone interested in a 128k business or an apprentice coming out of their time please contact Simon on 0409745508

Regards Jim Middleton secretary

June 2021

The next meeting will be held on Tuesday  22th 2021 at East Court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond at 5.30pm Please contact us if you will be attending for catering purposes 0418254950

At this meeting we will be taking nominations for officers for the coming year.If there are no other nominations the committee will stand for 2021

The audits have been completed for the association and will tabled at this meeting then forwarded to the Dept Fair Trading as required,

As yet we have had no correspondence from race clubs regarding the service increases for 2021.If we do not recieve any correspondence the new service rates will be charged from July 2021.

We have been recieving many complaints from horse owners about the lack of communication from farriers.We ask that members do better regarding this matter.If you do not want to provide your services please advise the client and/or provide them with a name and phone number of someone else that may be able to help them out.If you dont wish to talk to the client as a matter of courtesy send them a text at least.We purvey ouselves as being proffesional on your behalf so please act proffesionally.

Regards JIm Middleton

May 2021

The next meeting will be held on Thursday 20th 2021 at East Court Chinese Resteraunt 1st floor 144-148 Windsor Street Richmond at 6.00pm. Please contact us if you will be attending for catering purposes 0418254950

The association has made applications to increase service fees from July 1st to all the race clubs we currentley service. This is due to increases in Saturday race fields and a significant increases in trial numbers across all clubs.These fee increases will enable appropiate rates of pay to farriers that service these venues and a small increase in revenue for the association.

In the last few months there have been many enquirys regarding farriers in Bega and surrounding areas.There seems to be a lot of work down there but there are very few if any qualified farriers min these areas.It may be a good oppurtunity for anyone looking for sea change.

The Camden Show is keen to put on a major farrier competition in 2022.I have spoken to Steve Head regarding the matter and any interest in setting up and/or competing in the event please contact Steve. The association will sponsor the event in some way which is yet to be determined.

There has been some dicussion about how the Farrier industry will move forward in regards to associations.We have been down this path a number of times how ever due to egos and personal agendas it has been very difficult to gain any momentem. It may be time to approach the subject again in a different way.We have some ideas which will be discussed at the next meeting

Regards Jim Middleton secretary

MFA NSW History

Whilst the art of Farriery is age old, it was only 1906 in NSW when farriery was declared a registered trade and The Master Farriers Association of NSW was formed with 300 founding members.
With the advent of the First World War, many farriers were inducted into the Army as Farrier Sergeants and taught members of the Light Horse Brigade to tend their own mounts for preparation for their overseas duties. After the war, some of the sergeants chose to use their expertise differently and became veterinarians. Today, becoming a vet requires completion of a 6 year university course.
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Contact Info

President: Malcom Hunt

Secretary: Jim Middleton

Mobile: 0418 254 950

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