It has long been Britain’s most political cycling club, counting the suffragettes and the Labour party founder Keir Hardie among its pelotons. Founded in a Labour church in Birmingham in 1894 as a two-wheeled spin-off of the Clarion leftwing magazine, the Clarion Cycling Club’s early members used to pedal around the countryside putting socialist stickers on cows and trees, spreading leftist propaganda like fertiliser. But 126 years later, with membership booming, what is now the National Clarion Club (motto: Fellowship is Life) has voted to remove a reference to socialism from its constitution, after a majority of members decided it was “divisive and non-inclusive” and could alienate new members. Two-thirds of Clarion members voted at the annual general meeting (AGM) to replace “support for the principles of socialism” with support for “fairness, equality, inclusion and diversity”. Those who opposed the motion have accused the national club of “trying to erase history”. One warned there would “almost certainly be a split”, with some chapters threatening to form a breakaway organisation. Tim Mitchell, secretary of the Saddleworth Clarion in Greater Manchester, which has more than 100 members on the old Lancashire and Yorkshire border, said: “It’s wrong to turn our backs on our history. In my eyes it’s denying what we are and what we were. No one was suggesting that members have to wave a red flag around, but you can’t erase history. There’s a line that goes back in the Clarion all the way to Keir Hardie and the suffragettes.” He was particularly cross that the contentious motion came from the Tuxford Clarion, a Nottinghamshire branch which only started in the past 10 years. “They could have called themselves anything, they didn’t have to associate themselves with the Clarion movement. It’s like joining a vegan cycling club and then trying to make people eat meat.” He added: “There will almost certainly be a split.” Alex Southern, secretary of the London Clarion, said the constitution change “rips the heart out of the club”. Removing support for socialism “lessens its purpose and its uniqueness and makes it just like any other cycling club”, he said. “The Clarion movement has never been about shoving socialism down people’s throats but the idea that if people see the socialist principles of comradeship they will soon see the advantages.” The contentious motion carried at the AGM said: “The wording of our objects (support for the principles of socialism) … is, in our view divisive and non-inclusive. It also has the potential to alienate those members and future members who do not find a political statement originating from the late 1890s relevant to their membership of the Clarion Cycling Club today.” It added: “Tuxford Clarion’s view is that there must be a much better, more relevant and modern way to describe how our club behaves and what it holds as its aims and policies; fairness, equality, inclusion and diversity can hardly be argued against and we would want the Clarion to welcome anyone to its membership irrespective of their politics, their race and their gender.” Edward Gilder, secretary of the National Clarion Club, insisted that the local Clarion branches could write their own constitutions supporting socialism. “Each section is at liberty to conduct themselves however they want, with their own political alignment,” he said. The Clarion movement had been growing in strength in the new millennium, he said, with membership increasing to around 2,000 from 600 two decades ago. Simon Yates, winner of the Vuelta a España and his twin, Adam, who has worn the yellow jersey at the Tour de France, both rode with Bury Clarion before turning professional. Gilder insisted that history was not being erased: “There will be a new introduction to the constitution which will explain where the club came from and its history of socialism. But for many years the Clarion hasn’t made or received any political contributions. The essence in the constitution [of supporting socialism] has laid fallow for a long time now.”