Last September, the government launched the Pride in Place scheme to support community-led regeneration, which will share up to £5bn among 250 areas across the UK, in the hope of tackling regional inequality and deprivation.
Ministers say spending, which runs alongside policies like community right to buy, will only be approved “if Pride in Place boards have genuinely engaged their communities, so that community groups, local organisations and social clubs have been included in decisions on how the money should be spent”.
The inclusion of social clubs was welcomed by Jonny Gordon-Farleigh, co-director of the Centre for Democratic Business, who has been advocating for a new generation of social clubs across Britain – focusing on their role as cultural spaces and social infrastructure.
“We were really excited to see recognition,” he says. “As not-for-profit and member-run organisations, they offer affordable social and cultural spaces in neighbourhoods and high streets across the country. Often in areas of deprivation, they have a strong presence in areas that have been overlooked by government funding – and, as organisations controlled by local residents, they have an important role to play in local and national renewal.”
Social clubs in Britain have offered grassroots civic infrastructure for more than a century. Built by ordinary people to meet shared needs that neither the market nor the state would fulfil, they emerged from the mutual aid traditions of friendly societies and flourished in industrial towns from the 19th century onwards. Working men’s clubs, miners’ institutes and trades halls were never just places to drink, but spaces where communities educated themselves, organised for better conditions, celebrated, commiserated, and forged the solidarities that underpinned trade unionism and co-operation.
Their decline since the 1980s mirrored Britain’s wider social landscape: deindustrialisation, weakened unions, privatised leisure and the erosion of shared public life. At their peak in the 1970s, Britain’s 4,000 social clubs served four million members; there are now around 1,800 clubs, with just under a million members.
But Gordon-Farleigh believes that if they are reimagined for the 21st century – as co-op hubs, grassroots venues, mutual aid centres, and engines of community wealth – social clubs could again offer Britain the civic commons it needs. “For more than 100 years, social clubs built not just bars and bingo halls, but the civic architecture of working-class Britain,” he says. “They were places that were not centred on individualism, but focused on solidarity, shared responsibility and collective goals.
“Crucially, these were places where people could practise democratic life, and carry that experience into trade unions, councils, and even Parliament. At one point, club members held 178 seats in the Commons. And even those who did not take up leadership roles in these public institutions had the power to shape an emerging popular democracy and national project.”
Today, social clubs remain essential spaces for connection, learning, and participation – but remain overlooked by government and third sector. To tackle this, the Centre for Democratic Business launched 21st Century Social Clubs – a national platform to recognise, protect, and revitalise these community assets.
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Actions include a national survey of social clubs which found that over 80% of respondents indicated their club’s financial health was ‘poor to fair’, while 35% had borrowed money, and 73% would need to borrow or raise money over the next few years. Over 90% said they would benefit from fundraising support, with 75% wanting help with diversifying income streams.
Meanwhile, membership is fairly stable: 43% of clubs had seen an increase in membership over the last five years; 19% had stayed the same; 38% had fewer members.
These findings reflect a sector that needs support, says Gordon-Farleigh, “but they also tell a story that can make us feel realistically optimistic about the revival of this national network of collective spaces.”
This optimism was evident at last year’s inaugural 21st Century Social Club conference. Stronger Local Places: Rebuilding the Social Club Movement was hosted at the Mildmay Club in London in September, bringing together communities, policymakers, charities and funders to explore how social clubs can address today’s social and economic challenges.
“Social clubs are not just gathering spaces – they are critical lifelines for reducing loneliness and building meaningful connections within communities,” said Kirsty McNeill, Labour/Co-op MP for Midlothian, keynote speaker at the event. “To truly unlock their potential, we must prioritise them as part of our national social infrastructure.”
For Gordon-Farleigh, they are also about bringing people together across differences. “A big part of this is coalition-building – turning social clubs into a national cause that people care about, while making sure that Pride in Place, the Local Power Plan [a £1bn support plan for community energy] and other forms of support are followed through.”
He adds: “It was really encouraging to see social clubs named right at the top of the press release on the Local Power Plan. There are thousands of buildings owned by their members that have historically been among the least likely to receive retrofit or energy funding. This could mark a significant opportunity to use public resources more fairly and more effectively.”
Related: Government must do more to save community pubs, warns Plunkett UK
The 2026 social club conference will take place on 10 September at Redhills Durham. Originally known as Durham Miners’ Hall, it has recently reopened after a £14m renovation, with the restored Pitman’s Parliament acting as the main conference space.
Earlier last summer, McNeill led a delegation of social club members to meet with local growth minister Alex Norris, calling for government action to revive social clubs. Work continues with the Co-op Party and a group of MPs – including McNeill, Stella Creasy and Stephen Doughty – conducting a national engagement process calling for a ‘club charter’ to offer better policy, funding, and business support.
“It’s not that the government or the third sector needs to swoop in and save clubs,” adds Gordon-Farleigh, “it’s more about how we can back them — and enable them to save themselves.
“It’s important to ensure that policymakers continue to see member-owned social clubs as the important 21st century civic institutions they are – stable physical spaces, open to all generations, governed locally, and capable of supporting everything from community organising and adult education to active movement, health, and wellbeing.
“Revitalising social clubs does not replace economic regeneration but it will probably make economic regeneration more likely to succeed. We need to build a wider coalition between government and civil society, which can commission research, secure funding for development pilots, and ensure the members of these social clubs are part of regeneration efforts.”
