General News
17 October, 2025
A Men’s Shed in every measure
FOLLOWING a change in financial structure, Horsham Men’s Shed has emerged ready for a new phase in its existence in its home at the old ambulance station on O’Callaghans Parade next to the City Oval.
Treasurer, Rob Parfett, detailed the recent changes.
“We're a standalone shed now as of the 15th of July,” he said.
“We were sponsored by Wimmera PCP (primary care partnership) … we shut for six weeks while they did an audit of the books.”
President, Noel Hopper, said while the change was something of “a new enterprise to us”, he was looking forward to making the Men’s Shed not just survive but thrive.
“It's something we've been talking about doing for about four years,” he said, but the recent merger of the Hospital forced the call.
“Of course, now we’ve got to raise money to cover the costs,” Noel said.
“But we’re surviving the way we were before, it’s just we actually do have to do all the finances as well.
“At the moment, we're making things for people ... we're doing Christmas trees ready for the markets.”
He said they were always happy to take orders from people off the street and confident they could deal with any request.
“People just turn up with things they want made,” Noel said.
“And can we do it? Yeah, we can do it.”
Noel said although the enterprise was “nothing like running a normal business”, he loved that one of its prime motivations to exist was for the benefit of men’s health, something Rob has personally experienced.
“What we're basically here for is the well-being of the men,” Rob said.
“A man can come talk to us if he's got any problems, but also just to socialise with other people.
“I've been a member of Men's Sheds for about the last five years. I started in Leongatha, and I've only moved back to Horsham this year to be closer to my family.
“I lost my wife nearly three years ago now, and I was in that downward spiral, thinking of committing suicide and stuff like that, and the members of the shed helped get me back stable and got me back on the right track.”
He said he was definitely keen to give back to other men what he had received.
“Some of them have been through the same thing – not with the death in a family, through (but losing) jobs and stuff like that,” Rob said.
“So a lot of it is helping blokes like farmers, because they’re up and down all the time. “We've got quite a few farmers that just come in to talk.”
The opportunity to talk will be increasing.
Normally open just on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, the shed has recently started opening on Mondays as well, with several men and lots of hands-on carpentry and metalwork defining the activity on the workfloor.
“We'll try that for a few weeks and see where how it goes,” Noel said.
“They don’t have to turn up every day, they can (even) come in the morning or afternoon,” Rob added.
Both said the potential to learn was as great as the opportunity to teach, and hoped men of any age – even as young as 18 – would take advantage of the resource.