Former BBC newsman Jon Sopel FINALLY gets his Garrick wish… just as club is embroiled in sexism row because of male-only membership
The news that two leading establishment figures were pressured to leave London’s exclusive Garrick Club amid a sexism storm was one of the biggest stories of the past week.
Yet listeners of Jon Sopel and Emily Maitlis’ top-rated topical podcast The News Agents didn’t hear a peep about it — and I think I might have an explanation.
Because I can reveal that after a long wait, former BBC journalist Sopel has just joined the legendary Covent Garden institution – although the timing could have been better.
The £1,700-a-year club is at the center of controversy over its all-male membership policy. Last week, top civil servant Simon Case and MI6 boss Sir Richard Moore resigned after their names were published on a leaked membership list.
Jon Sopel, 64, will find some former BBC colleagues in the elegant corridors of the Garrick club
Sopel has just joined the legendary Covent Garden institution after a long wait
Critics said their involvement with the 193-year-old club made a mockery of their efforts to make their institutions more inclusive, but one member felt it showed a lack of ‘backbone’ to be ‘bullied by the thought police’ into quitting .
Sopel, 64, will find several former BBC colleagues in the club’s elegant corridors. Jeremy Paxman finally got in some time ago – eleven years after he was blacklisted for writing an anti-establishment book.
The institute, famous for its salmon and cucumber clubs, has long been urged to admit women as members, and not just as guests. In 2011, Joanna Lumley tried unsuccessfully to become the first female member when she was introduced by Downton star Hugh Bonneville.
Member Stephen Fry recently told me he would like to see women join, saying: ‘The Garrick would be all the better for it and rub his eyes in amazement that anyone ever opposed the idea.’
Maybe now Sopel will help take the lead…