Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club starts events again amidst ownership disputes

With a new campaign gathering speed to save one of Bethnal Green’s most original venues, the club’s fate is not as clear as it once seemed.

Events are back up and running at the Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club (BGWMC), a combined queer and alternative venue and old-school member’s only boozer. A potential legal battle looms.

The original Working Men’s Club members, who own the building as a collective, announced the intention to sell the building in May, giving resident events promoters Warren Dent and Charlotte West-Williams two months’ notice to return the keys. 

Dent announced the club would be shutting in July – meaning a loss of a venue for the many queer, transgressive and underground events that call the club home. 

A combination of massive community blowback, the involvement of performer’s union Equity and legal advice has changed the tides. 

Since then, an investigation by London Centric has revealed a mire of legal grey zones, disputes over who can sell the traditionally community-owned venue and a controversial £4 million price tag set by the members.  

The club has been running since 1887 and got into hot water with mounting repair costs and dwindling members in the early 2000s. Club members gave promoter Warren Dent a license to put on events in 2006, and the stream of income allowed the club to stay open in a fragile symbiosis until recently. 

While confusion reigns, Dent has decided to continue putting on events at the club, with popular nights ‘Re-mix’ and ‘Sexquisite,’ returning to perform again.

An Instagram post by @bgwmc (which The Slice understands is run by Dent and West-Williams) announced events would be restarting and said: 

‘This is essential for keeping performers and workers paid and in-work after nearly four months of closure. The proceeds from these events will also go towards the fighting fund and towards saving the club for future generations.’ 

Performer’s Union Equity is also spearheading a campaign by the community group ‘Friends of Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club,’  which has been organising protests, petitions and fundraising to stop the club from shutting.

The group includes performers, residents and punters interested in preserving the club as a community-owned and run space, and is working alongside Dent.

Its main aim is to collect signatures from people who work and live in Tower Hamlets on this petition to save BGWMC. The more signatures the petition collects, the more formally the Council must consider the proposal. 

So far the campaign has successfully led to the BGWMC being declared an asset of community value, meaning community members will have bidding priority if the building goes up for sale.

The Council have also decided that if sold, the club needs to remain a queer-friendly venue, and could not become housing or a retail space. They last met with Friends of BGWMC on December 5. 

Nick Keeghan, a representative for Equity, said it was unlikely the community would be able to fundraise to buy the building. 

‘At the moment we think the best hope for the club is if Tower Hamlets steps in and buys it, holds it as an asset and leases it back to the community,’ he said. 

Keeghan explained that sometimes developers invest in protected properties and let them sit undeveloped, with the hopes that protections erode a few years down the line. ‘It’s still at risk of being bought up by someone with very deep pockets and just staying empty,’ he said.  

The Slice has attempted to contact the original members of the club but has not heard back so far. 

However, a post on Instagram by an account called @bgwmc.official (distinct from the @bgwmc account) reads ‘We are sorry to report that BGWMC is in financial difficulties owing to the actions of a promoter at the Club over a number of years.

‘Having exhausted all other avenues, the trustees and members of the Club have reluctantly decided to market the property for sale. We stress that the overriding objective is to facilitate a sale that preserves the Club’s current use as a community asset/performance venue and we will be working with interested parties to achieve that.’ 

The statement is presumably by the members and possible sellers of the BGWMC, who Friends of BGWMC were briefly in negotiations with to keep the club open as an events space. 

Equity said: ‘The negotiation was to encourage a sale that would allow the venue to continue in community ownership and prevent it being lost to developers. It broke down because the sellers wanted to evict the sitting tenant and continue with a sale to the highest bidder.

‘We would urge them to get back in touch and work with us to find a way forward that will allow this cultural asset to remain in the hands of the community.’

You can find the petition to save the BGWMC here.