Two of Britain’s biggest media outlets have both reported on golf’s participation problems in the last few days, and both stated that the game is still elitist.
England lost more than a quarter of its monthly golfers between 2008 and September 2015, from 1.54 million to just over 1.1 million, and participation fell again in the last three months of 2015.
This month alone at least three golf clubs have closed down: Whitekirk Golf and Country Club in Scotland, West Chiltington Golf Club in West Sussex and Staplehurst Golf Centre in Kent, while also this month Beckenham Place Park in London announced it will close.
On February 17, Radio 4’s Today programme looked at the issues surrounding golf, including the fact that the land that many courses lie on is worth a ‘premium’ at a time when there is a housing shortage in the UK.
“Golf has been struggling with a drop in the numbers playing and courses closing,” said presenter Sarah Montague.
“There is a national trend of the declining usage of golf courses,” added Rob Bonnet.
When interviewing people about the decline, one member of the public said: “Access to golf is elitist.”
Sarah Montague added: “The problems include the time it takes to play and the perceptions that is an elitist game.”
Meanwhile, in a comment piece on the Guardian’s website, the former assistant editor of The Times, Richard Williams, gave his views on the current issues surrounding Wentworth, where the new owner, Reignwood, has proposed large increases in membership fees.
He too concluded that the game has an elitist image.
“Golf clubs have always been surrounded by an air of exclusivity and privilege,” he wrote.
“They are bastions of the sort of snobbery that takes offence at the manners of new money. The very existence of somewhere like the Wentworth Estate is predicated on exactly a kind of social cleansing that Reignwood seem to be undertaking now.”
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