Legacies & Local Change at Leamington Town Hall

On the 29 May 2025, Warwick District Council welcomed us to Leamington Town Hall for an exciting Resonate Late about Women in Politics, Past & Present.

Did you know that suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst once spoke at Leamington Town Hall? This little fact made it feel like the ideal venue to host activist, scholar and writer Helen Pankhurst, great-granddaughter of Emmeline and granddaughter of Sylvia Pankhurst. Together with academics, local government experts and a special musical performance, we came together for an evening of inspiring talks and conversation.

Upon arrival, we walked through the grand front doors of the newly renovated Town Hall, up the imposing staircase and into the Council Chamber, a room typically reserved for important local Council meetings. This would certainly have been the case when Emmeline visited, although ‘the platform was decorated with choice chrysanthemums, and at the rear were displayed the well known colours of the Women’s Social and Political Union’ (according to a newspaper article of the time). Whilst we didn’t have flowers, we did have purple and green lights illuminating the walls of the Council Chamber! For one night, we reimagined the room as a place for members of the community to come together, showing that traditional spaces can have new uses.

We began with an ‘In Conversation’ with Helen Pankhurst. In 2018, Helen established Centenary Action, a cross-party campaigning force supporting women, bringing local, national and international organisations together to amplify voices and campaign for change. You can find out more about Centenary Action on their website here. She talked about the legacy of her family and how she’s used this to spur action today, to push for equal representation of men and women in Parliament. She also told us about some great suffrage inspired jewellery from Wear & Resist, which you can check out on their website here.

A particularly inspiring moment of Helen’s talk was when she urged us to take small action about things that matter to us – it may not fix the problem, but it will change our individual relationship to the problem, and that is powerful.

During the break, we had live music from Shanade Morrow of local band, The Pips. As we came back together for the second half of the evening, Shanade performed ‘Deeds’, a powerful song written in collaboration with Dr Tara Morton about Suffragettes. This song is unreleased, and you are welcome to listen and download it from their website here.

Shanade’s performance of ‘Deeds’ led us nicely into Dr Tara Morton’s talk. She took us back in time to early 20th century Leamington, to find out about the individuals who lobbied for votes for women in our local area. These women, and many more, can be seen on Tara’s Mapping Women’s Suffrage website here.

Next up, Professor Khursheed Wadia discussed her research into increasing the representation of racially minoritised women in UK local politics. Khursheed showed us that there are not only barriers to entering local government. Once elected, women of the global ethnic majority face further institutional barriers. You can read the full report, including Khursheed’s 15 recommendations for change, on the Elect Her website here.

Clare Mitchell works in Development and Regeneration at Warwick District Council. Clare introduced us to the important men and women that make Warwick District Council run on a day-to-day basis. It’s not just politicians, but builders, architects, dancers, administrators and many others. Lots of the people keeping things going are women, including the architect who worked on the redevelopment of Leamington Town Hall. It was wonderful to hear about women working in a political space from a different angle, and to platform their work alongside academics and activists.

Finally, all the speakers came together to sit on a panel and dive into discussion with the audience.

We had a wonderful evening and hope you did too!