The UK’s only museum dedicated to the suffrage movement is in dire need of investment, campaigners have argued, speaking before the 100-year anniversary of the first women gaining the right to vote.

The Women’s Social and Political Union, an organisation that campaigned for woman’s suffrage in the UK, was founded in the parlour of Emmeline Pankhurst’s home in Chorlton-on-Medlock, south Manchester, in 1903.

The building currently houses a three-room museum – including the parlour – along with the charity Manchester Women’s Aid, which supports victims of domestic abuse. The museum is staffed by volunteers and receives no public funding, instead relying on donations. It opens to visitors between 10am and 4pm on Thursdays and for three hours every other Sunday.

The Representation of the People Act, which gave the vote to all men over 21 and women over 30 who met certain property qualifications, was passed into law in February 1918. As the centenary approaches, calls have been made to fund the Pankhurst Centre to make it a “major and significant museum” that tells the story of women’s suffrage and the subsequent women’s rights movement.



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The writer and activist Helen Pankhurst, great-granddaughter of Emmeline Pankhurst, said the building held symbolic significance. “This is the real building where a historical event happened that defined this pivotal change in our ideas of citizenship,” she said.

“Yet there is no other public funding for it. Is this again the perpetuation of women’s interests not being valued, not being given real power and visibility? I think the answer to that is a resounding yes.”

Gail Heath, the director of the Pankhurst Trust, said that while the Museum of London and the People’s History Museum both had displays dedicated to the suffragettes, the country should have a properly funded museum dedicated to the subject.

“The more the suffragette story is talked about the better, because it is inspirational,” she said. “A little group of women got together in that parlour downstairs. Emmeline was a single parent at the time, she had a part-time job, and they started a revolutionary movement. It’s a story that needs to be told.”

The organisation had a bid for funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund rejected last year, but is in the process of submitting another. Heath said it would take about £3.5m to transform the centre into an “enhanced museum attraction” with space for school groups to learn about the suffragettes.

The building is owned by Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS foundation trust, which in 1979 applied for permission to demolish it. Following a campaign by the Victorian Society and other local groups, the authority agreed to lease the house to the Pankhurst Trust indefinitely in return for a symbolic payment of one suffragette sash every year. It was finally opened to the public by Barbara Castle and Helen Pankhurst in 1987.

The Pankhurst Centre merged with Manchester Women’s Aid in 2014, providing a mutually beneficial arrangement in which the museum was given more financial security and the charity had a space to run from. The building functions as a women’s centre, and has a food bank in its basement. “One of the defining things about the Pankhurst Centre is that we are not just a museum,” said Heath. “We are still active in the struggle.”

Last year the museum – with its photographs and assorted suffragette memorabilia – welcomed 2,700 visitors from across the world. “People come here because it is almost an act of pilgrimage, and even though our exhibit is a little bit tired and old and needs investment, they all feel the power of being in that room,” said Heath. The Pankhurst Centre has been unable to accept donations of key artefacts in the suffragette story because they cannot afford the insurance to look after them.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Helen Pankhurst at the Pankhurst Centre in Manchester, the family home of her great-grandmother, Emmeline Pankhurst. Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

Though it is a Grade II listed building, the Pankhurst Centre is hemmed in on all sides by new wings of the St Mary’s hospital, making expansion more complicated. “We use every available space,” said Heath. “We will be digging out part of the cellar, because it’s full of rubble. We’re going to extend out there with a subterranean room to expand it. We are going to put corridors along the back, so you don’t have to cross space.”

Pankhurst and Heath agree that there have been signs that the centenary might bring the change of fortunes that the museum needs. Earlier this month the Pankhurst Trust received £144,594 from the government’s Centenary Cities fund to run two separate educational projects inspired by the Representation of the People Act.

A few days later it was announced that the government would help to fund a statue of Emmeline Pankhurst in the city of her birth, the first of a woman to be erected in Manchester since a Queen Victoria statue was unveiled in 1901. “This is 100 years late, but still a very important and appreciated recognition by the establishment,” said Pankhurst.

“I think that in terms of the attitude of society in general, there’s a realisation now that you can’t assume that things are going to continue to get better in terms of women’s rights,” she said. “The last couple of years in particular have taught us that we have got to fight to hold on to the gains that we have made.”