Two more men-only clubs in UK to ask members if women should join

Two more of London’s oldest remaining gentlemen’s clubs have invited members this month to give an opinion on whether they think it is time to change their rules to allow women to join.

A poll of members of the 140-year-old Flyfishers’ Club will begin tomorrow, and a decision on the question of women members is expected to be announced on 4 October. The Savile Club, established in 1868 for writers and artists, is to hold an informal discussions on 26 September over whether women should be admitted.

The move to hold a binding vote at Flyfishers’ Club comes after complaints about its discriminatory membership policy expressed by two of Britain’s most high-profile female anglers earlier this year.

Amie Battams, a campaigner against sexism and elitism in fishing, wrote to the club, whose patron is the king, in May to express her sadness that the “club has not evolved to include women”.

Marina Gibson, who runs a fishing school in North Yorkshire, also drew attention to the club’s rules during an interview to promote her memoir Catch Catch Release, which details her struggles to be accepted into the male-dominated world of fishing. She said she “would absolutely love to join” and added that there were many “really hardcore women anglers” who would like to be able to go to the club to “talk about fishing to other fishermen”.

She said male anglers had appeared “quite scared” when she first made the suggestion. Several men messaged her after she spoke out suggesting she should instead join the Women’s Institute if she wanted to belong to a club, or set up a women-only flyfishing group. She said she wanted to have access to the club’s library and to a community of people who are serious not just about fishing, but also about the environmental threats to Britain’s rivers and other conservation-related issues.

Female anglers have intermittently attempted to secure membership since at least the 1970s, but all previous requests have been rebuffed. Gibson responded with satisfaction on Wednesday to the news that members of the club would be voting on the issue. “I’m excited to hear the outcome of the vote,” she said.

Discussions have been launched over women’s membership at several other gentlemen’s clubs in recent months, after a vote in May by members of the Garrick club, permitting women to join the club 193 years after it was founded. The Garrick has subsequently allowed two women (the actors Judi Dench and Siân Phillips) to join the 1,500 male members.

Club secretaries at some of around a dozen remaining men-only clubs in central London are understood have consulted lawyers over whether their rules could also be reinterpreted after the Garrick vote, which rested on new legal advice that the pronoun “he” in the club’s rulebook should also be taken to mean “she”.

Members of the Savile club have been invited to express their views on women’s membership during an unofficial meeting at the club’s white stuccoed building on Brook Street in central London.

The event has been organised by two members who favour women’s membership, who messaged others promising that “all opinions around the issue” would be heard and reassuring them that discussions would “be conducted in the proper Savile way: face to face and drink in hand”. “You will hear from those of us who think change is a desirable, indeed natural, next step for the club, with the event delving into its core foundations and the nature of the ethos and traditions which make the Savile so unique,” the message said.

The Savile club was approached for comment, but did not respond. The Flyfishers’ club secretary Mark Jenkins said: “We are a private club. We have no comment for the press on this matter.”