The Garrick Club: What is it and why is it so outdated?
Over 200 senior lawyers and legal professionals have signed an open letter calling on the Garrick Club to abolish its men’s-only membership policy. Signatories (of whom over 71 are men) include Michael Mansfield, Lord Alex Carlisle and Sir Geoffrey Bindman, who, it has been reported, believe that the Club’s membership policy is ‘not consistent with a commitment to equality and diversity’.
This campaign was launched by Emily Bendell in the form of a legal battle, seeking an injunction preventing the Club from “continuing” its “unlawful” and “discriminatory policy”. The campaign’s official website explains that the campaign was created to combat the negative impact created by this single-gender policy, particularly in relation to the legal profession. Bendel instructed Leigh Day, claiming that this policy is a breach of the 2010 Equality and Diversity Act.
The campaign also elucidates that “Men are afforded an opportunity through their membership to form connections with senior legal practitioners and members of the judiciary to support their professional aspirations. This is an opportunity expressly denied to women and contributes to the gross underrepresentation of women at the top of the legal profession”.
This issue was raised at an AGM in 2015 where the poll failed to achieve the necessary 2/3rds majority, garnering only a 50.5% majority.
When women are excluded without good reason or cast as ‘guests’ — good enough to be wined and dined but not to belong — in a forum in which professionally advantageous invisible connections are made, it undermines the position of women and feeds the conscious and unconscious biases of men.
Lady Hale rationalised this issue, referring to the Garrick Club’s policy (among other “systemic barriers”) as a factor as to why women did not reach the upper echelongs of the judiciary. In addition, it was decided in 2014 that Lord Irvine of Laird, the former Lord Chancellor; Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, the former President of the Supreme Court; and Lord Woolf, former Lord Chief Justice, should no longer be honorary members of the Magistrates Association due to their membership to the Club.
This follows The Lawyer magazine’s report that approximately 25% of the senior judiciary hold memberships.
The campaign also explained the broader impact of such policies. It stated “the highest-ranking members of the legal profession participate in and preside over court cases that have far-reaching effects. It should not be the case that women are under-represented in places of such influence”.
This level of exclusion and privilege, the campaign argues, is wholly inconsistent with the ethos of the judiciary, and this was echoed in the Magistrates Association’s decision.
The Garrick Club have not responded publicly, and the case is still ongoing.
Thomas Bains
