A Salford university employee and graduate, Amber-Lilly Goulden has explained her pride at joining the University on a march to the unveiling of the Emmeline Pankhurst statue on December 14.

Amber, a distant relative of Emmeline said: “It is an honour to be coming to the unveiling of the Emily Pankhurst statue.

“She is a massive part of my family history, so I won’t only be representing my workplace and the uni where i got my degree in, but also family.

“She was a Goulden before she was married, so she really has been a massive part of my family history.

“It is going to be a really good celebration of how women have come so far in the last 100 years.”

University of Salford students and staff are invited to join in with the march, with people meeting at the old fire station at 10 AM on the morning of December 14.

The statue is being unveiled in St Peter’s Square, and is a celebration of women finally getting the vote, a role Emmeline played a huge part in.

Amber knows the importance of celebrating important women in our history, and feels the decision to award her ancestor was well deserved.

“I think that it’s really important, I’m not too sure of the statistics, but I know that there is plenty of male statues and only a few female ones.” She said

“It’s brilliant that there is now going to be another woman there, to celebrate women getting the vote.”

Redressing the balance

Councillor Andrew Simcock, speaking earlier in the year echoed this sentiment, that not enough important female historical figures have been commemorated.

The chair of the Emmeline statue campaign, he said: “The original idea started in the sculpture hall, of the town hall.

“I was sitting there with a friend of mine, looking at all the different busts in the sculpture hall, and she said ‘these are all men, where are the women?’ So I took a walk around the city centre and realised she was right.

“There are 16 men and one woman which is Queen Victoria, and we need to do something about it.”

Emmeline was the winner, out of 20 women available to vote for to have a memorial statue, with Hazel Reeves designing the statue that is set to be unveiled on Friday the 14th.

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