A BOARD spill at one of the country’s most prominent breed societies, Herefords Australia, is in the wind, fuelled by a half a million dollar financial loss last year.
HA has been served with notices from the sufficient number of members required - greater than five per cent - to instigate the calling of a general meeting.
Twelve resolutions seeking the removal of 12 board members will be determined at the meeting.
Members will be informed with 21 days of the details of the meeting, which must be held within 60 days of the notice.
The group of members driving the push includes past presidents and directors.
They have thrown their support behind new chief executive officer Dr Alex Ball, who put in motion a review of the corporate governance structure soon after taking up the reigns this year.
Spokesman for the group pushing for a regime change, Michael Samios, Coldsteam Poll Hereford Stud at Woodstock, said members looked forward to the significant contribution Dr Ball would make to the breed and to his guidance in reinvigorating membership.
“Dr Ball needs additional staff to implement his plans,” he said.
“We hope to make that possible by reviewing programs and all business arrangements.”
HA has 847 full or life members and a further 500 commercial members.
Agitation has been mounting since the 2016 annual general meeting at Dubbo in June, where questions were raised about the value to members of expenditures that led to the $500,000 loss.
Mr Samios said the current board had instigated a number of programs that were financially unsustainable.
“There are contractual arrangements and board decisions not in the financial interests of members,” he said.
The group calling for the spill believe the current board has no plans for addressing the declining membership and revenues, while increasing costs associated with the business continue.
Mr Samios said it was not expected all board members would be removed.
The signatures to call the general meeting had been collected for some time but ‘elder statesmen’ had requested the move be deferred in the hope some identities would voluntarily step down, he said.
The intention was never to ‘air HA’s dirty laundry in public’, he said
“Hard questions were being asked of directors and the hope was it could be sorted out without having to take this step,” Mr Samios said.
That clearly hasn’t happened, so it’s now game on.