*Exclusive* Is now the time for the barefoot trimming industry to be regulated?

Going barefoot is a topic that can generate heated discussions in the equestrian world.

Many top showjumpers compete on surfaces barefoot, and it is widely accepted that not all horses need to wear shoes. But that decision should be based on the individual horse and discussed with its hoofcare provider.

The debate perhaps should not be whether shod or unshod is best, but who is delivering that service. In the UK, only a qualified and registered farrier can legally prepare the foot of a horse for the immediate inception of a shoe and fit a shoe by nailing or otherwise.

But there is no regulation on who can trim a horse’s hooves, so a person does not need to hold any qualifications, registration or insurance. A person who has never been around a horse can legally offer a trimming service and charge money for this – as can a farrier who has been removed or suspended from the Farriers Registration Council’s (FRC) register.

Unlike vets and farriers, who are accountable to the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) and the FRC respectively, there is no regulatory body for barefoot trimming. And until 2021, although a number of UK and international organisations offered trimming courses, there was no accredited UK qualification.

But progress has been made to provide “self-regulation” of the barefoot industry – and in April 2021, the Ofqual-regulated qualification was created – the LANTRA level-five diploma in equine podiatry, only available via Equine Podiatry Training Ltd (EPT).

Before this, EPT offered a diploma in equine podiatry and was among the organisations involved in the creation of the 2010 equine barefoot care National Occupational Standards.

Richard Vialls, EPT co-founder and a Equine Podiatry Association (EPA) council member, told H&H that since EPT took its first students in 2008, the aim had always been to gain national accreditation.

“We felt we needed to demonstrate that we weren’t just training people, but we were serious about quality and standards,” he said.

The LANTRA level-five diploma in equine podiatry

The part-time course, which takes around two-and-a-half to three years to complete and costs £6,250, is led by tutors in podiatry, grassland management, advanced anatomy and farriery. The course is 561 hours long, of which 200 hours is “hands-on” training, including 70 hours on trimming, followed by an exam.

Students then work on non-pathological case studies under a mentor, then six months of case studies of pathological cases, such as laminitis or navicular, before a final assessment. This comprises a three-hour theory paper, lameness video exam, pathology trimming exam on a cadaver leg and a trim on a horse. The pass mark is 80% and since 2021, 15 people have gained the qualification.

“Generally, about half the students pass first time and if they fail any one element, they have up to a year to resit it,” said Dr Vialls.

Dr Vialls said achieving the Ofqual accreditation has given the diploma the “credibility that we didn’t have when it was our own qualification”.

But he adds that other areas of the equestrian industry are “taking their time to recognise what we do and formally adopt it”.

“The actions of some other barefoot groups in the past have created suspicions, so that’s been an issue. We have this situation where vets on the ground like what we do, and on a day-to-day basis we work with vets very closely across lots of practices. But people at the top of the veterinary profession are still sitting on the fence,” he said.

“It was always going to take a long time. We’re the disruptors and we need to prove to everybody that we are credible.”

H&H asked Dr Vialls what recognition might look like. He said that the EPT and EPA would like “acknowledgement from the veterinary profession that we should be part of the process”, similar to paraprofessionals such as dental technicians and physios.

He added that he does not see “any likelihood” of a law change to incorporate trimming “any time soon”.

“We’ve been involved with working groups with Defra and the opinion of Defra is that there isn’t a problem to be solved by changing regulation at this point. They want to see good quality self-regulation,” he said.

“Defra did research 10 years ago and couldn’t find any evidence that there was more of a problem among barefoot trimmers than regulated farriers. On that basis, the decision was taken that the regulation of barefoot trimming would be kept as self-regulation for the foreseeable.”

H&H asked Defra to confirm that its research found no welfare issues and there was no case for statutory regulation – and was told “we weren’t able to determine where these statements came from”. But the spokesperson added that there are “no plans” to amend existing legislation and “we keep our approach under review”.

H&H vet Karen Coumbe said a “good farrier can do everything a barefoot trimmer can do and more”.

“Although I have encountered some cooperative trimmers, who have been very patient trimming challenging ponies’ feet, I would still choose to use a properly qualified farrier for my own horse. I know every farrier has undergone a recognised apprenticeship and rigorous training and has a professional organisation behind him or her,” she said.

“The same is unclear to me for barefoot trimmers. There are concerns that in some cases, horses can suffer and complex conditions go unrecognised by individuals trimming their feet with limited qualifications, who may not understand the potential underlying pathology. I question how fully insured a barefoot trimmer may be and how responsible they will be for their actions in the event of any complications ensuing.”

Self-regulation

The EPA provides a “self-regulating professional body” for equine podiatrists and those who have completed the former diploma or the Ofqual-accredited course, and students, can apply for membership. The association has a code of conduct members must abide by, and continuous professional development and insurance requirements.

“We’re trying to provide a professional group that owners and other professionals can trust. We have high standards of entry and to maintain your entry on our register,” said EPA council member Helen Stowell.

The EPA has 43 members, and Ms Stowell estimates there to be around 100 to 200 barefoot practitioners operating in the UK. This number cannot be verified, because trimmers do not need to be registered.

“It’s quite a segmented industry; there will be independent trimmers doing a very good job – and if they weren’t doing a good job the market would have called them out by now – but they don’t come under our banner,” she said.

“When we set ourselves up, our take was that we can only regulate people whose entry standard we understand. If you were trying to regulate somebody who has trained in a different way and something goes wrong, how on earth could you regulate that person’s actions?

“I think other sectors of the horse industry would like the situation to be easier to understand and for there to be an umbrella regulator, but I’m not sure that’s plausible. We feel that we set a high standard and take care of maintaining that high standard via our own members.”

H&H asked Ms Stowell if it is a concern that people could be operating without appropriate training or support of an organisation.

“I don’t think we can say anything other than it is a concern, because that’s part of the reason we’re doing business the way we’re trying to do it,” she said. “We’re not the cowboys who do a three-day course and go and trim horses; we’re doing everything we can to ensure we are the opposite of that characterisation.”

But could regulation help the industry?

“We are in an industry that is used to having a very high and statutory standard of regulation. Vets and farriers have regulatory bodies, and we are told by the existing industry that we’re unregulated and we’re criticised for that, but I think there’s an argument about proportionality of regulation,” said Ms Stowell.

“For a profession that’s very small like ours, trying to push for a statutory regulatory approach is taking a sledgehammer to crack a nut. We’re operating in an era where governments’ willingness to get engaged in statutory regulation is far less than what it was.

“There are much bigger industries with much bigger problems, which would be far higher up the list to have a regulatory approach than barefoot trimming. That’s why the EPA is adopting a self-regulation model.”

Trimmer and EPA member Ellen Curnow, who holds the level-five diploma, told H&H if legislation were brought in that required trimmers to hold qualifications, “the industry would come under less scrutiny”.

“The concern is that as anyone can go out and trim, it opens the industry up for criticism because there could be people doing things that are harmful. But I believe there are people who are good at what they do who don’t have the level-five qualification. And if legislation was brought in, we could lose them from the industry, which would be a real shame,” she said.

“Regulation would have to be very robustly worded to filter out the potential ‘cowboys’ without losing the really good people, and I think that would be very hard to achieve.”

She added that being an EPA member provides structure and network support for trimmers.

“The EPA is very open to discussion for the betterment of the industry. Members are from a lot of different backgrounds and there’s a lot of knowledge that we are all able to draw on and contribute to,” she said.

“And when trimming, if you encounter something that’s a rare or complex case, it would be highly unlikely a vet isn’t involved and you’re working as part of a veterinary-led team.”

The Institute of Applied Equine Podiatry (IAEP) offers UK and European-based courses, ranging from two days to a full diploma, with further “advanced” and “master” qualifications available. To achieve a diploma in applied equine podiatry (DAEP), individuals must have completed 500 hours’ learning and passed the final written theory and practical exams.

To maintain their “active” DAEP status and be listed on the institute’s register, graduates must abide by the IAEP’s code of ethics and carry out continuing professional development (CPD). These courses do not hold Ofqual accreditation.

Karen Beaumont holds the advanced diploma and is the institute’s UK faculty member. She said the IAEP looked at trying to gain a UK qualification, but this was “difficult” as the founder, KC LaPierre is from America, and “he felt that his education program was extremely robust”.

Ms Beaumont added that the IAEP short courses are not aimed at people wishing to provide trimming services.

“Our two- and three-day courses are for people to educate themselves in horses’ feet. So when decisions have to be made that they’ve got a foundation, they’re absolutely not for them to go out trimming,” she said.

Ms Beaumont said the barefoot industry “has come a long way”, but she is not in favour of regulation and she believes owners should do their homework on who they use for hoofcare.

“Regulation I think would stop innovation, discovery and learning. We often find that there’s no one way. I feel it’s about educating the owner and I think the buck stops there,” she said.

Although there are responsible trimmers operating under membership bodies and with qualifications and insurance, these are not legal requirements and people can operate without. If a horse were injured by an unqualified and uninsured trimmer, there would be no regulatory body to hold that person to account.

The farrier apprenticeship, a level three, takes 48 months to complete and involves college blocks and on-the-job training with an approved training farrier, followed by completion of the end-point assessment.

The farriery occupational standard, approved by the FRC, involves knowledge, skills and behaviours on topics including health and safety, anatomy, physiology and equine biomechanics, understanding of diagnosis methods and lameness evaluations. The end-point assessment involves a written test, professional discussion with assessors, practical assessment of an unshod trim, and practical shoeing assessment. On completion of the end-point assessment, apprentices may apply for registration with the FRC.

A farrier’s view

Farrier Cliff Barnes AWCF emphasised that the trim is the “most important part” of hoof care and said that although there are “good trimmers and bad, as there are farriers”, he believes trimmers should be regulated.

“As farriers, the whole of what we do is about the trim, and without having the understanding of what that trim should be for the horse in question, a lot of damage can potentially be done,” he said.

“You can cause all sorts of lamenesses short- or long-term. If the trim is not balanced to that horse and you have a side-to-side imbalance, you risk ligament damage higher up. If the toe is left too long, you risk ligament and tendon damage to the back of the foot and limb. And if you trim the toe too hard, you could end up with a compromised hoof capsule, causing the pedal bone in severe cases to move.

“From what I’ve seen personally, there are very few trimmers who have enough one-to-one tuition early enough in their career to understand some of the complications around trimming horses at different stages of the year.”

British Farriers and Blacksmiths Association (BFBA) president Abigail Bunyard told H&H the BFBA “believes strongly that regulation should extend to trimming”.

“From our side, work does continue to bring about legislation,” she said, adding that the topic would be “less emotive” if trimming was regulated. “And if people want change, they should contact their MP,” she said.

“Why would the trimming industry and for that matter the wider horse community not want trimmers to be regulated? Regulation means on day one of qualification everybody is at the same level. It then insures equine protection if that level were to drop. There are fantastic equine podiatrists in this country and regulation would only improve their standing by ensuring equine welfare.”

An RCVS spokesperson told H&H that barefoot trimmers were looked at as part of its legislation working party’s review (2017–2020) – but during discussions, the party felt any regulation would be a matter of consideration by the FRC.

The FRC’s position

An FRC spokesperson told H&H it has been the council’s position for “many years that trimming [should] be subject to statutory regulation, for animal welfare and public protection”.

“This view has been expressed to successive governments,” he said. “While the council were keen to make amendments to the core of the Farriers (Registration) Act when drafting the 2017 legislation, including provision for trimming, the government of the day were only able to make available resources to amend the constitution of the council.

“Those who read your journal may take the view that extension of the act to include trimming is desirable for reasons of animal welfare, and may wish to take the opportunity to offer that view to their MP.”

• Do you feel that the barefoot trimming industry should be regulated? Send your thoughts to hhletters@futurenet.com, including your name, and nearest town and county, for consideration for publication on our letters page.

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