Historic museum collections are to be permanently relocated.

Cheshire East Council has given the go-ahead for West Park Museum's collections to be transferred to the Silk Museum and Macclesfield Town Hall.

The economy and growth committee met on Tuesday, January 14, and unanimously agreed to the move due to the deterioration of the West Park building, which is no longer suitable to house the collections, owned by the council.

Macclesfield councillor Fiona Wilson said: "The future of the West Park Museum collections, I feel, is now secure.

"There have been concerns locally regarding the building and the conditions in which the collection was kept in."

Many of the articles came from the international travels of members of the Macclesfield-based Brocklehurst family, whose wealth was made from silk manufacturing.

Councillor Wilson added: "The Brocklehurst family history is very important to Macclesfield. Two of the Brocklehurst family were MPs for Macclesfield."

The West Park Museum collections will be permanently relocated to the Silk Museum and Macclesfield Town Hall (Credit: Nub News)

The collections also include military medals, plaster busts, 19th century paintings and items relating to law and order in the town.

There also a significant number of Egyptology and oriental items.

Councillors were told the collections had already been moved to preserve them and the vote on Tuesday was to make the relocation permanent.

Most of the collections would be at the Silk Museum with 10 paintings to be displayed at Macclesfield Town Hall.

They were also told they were not making any decision yet about the West Park Museum building – that would be decided at a future meeting.

Committee chair Michael Gorman said: "This is a really important collection which should absolutely stay in Macclesfield and be enjoyed by residents of Macclesfield as intended by the benefactor. But it will also be of interest to academics."

Councillor Chris O'Leary added: "I welcome this. I hope that we can make more of the Brocklehurst history as part of the collection."