While the rest of the country turned its attention to the outcome of the EU referendum, the constituency of Batley and Spen was preoccupied with mourning the loss of its MP a week after her death.
On a gloriously sunny Thursday afternoon in the village of Birstall, around 200 people gathered in the market square to observe a minute’s silence for Jo Cox.
Leading the vigil, the vicar of Birstall, Paul Knight, asked the crowd to hold hands, chant “we stand together” and pledge to stand up against hatred, violence and inequality wherever they encountered it.
“This has been such a tragedy that it has certainly been in the foremost of people’s minds and I personally hope that today will be a kind of full stop for Birstall and that we can get on with our lives,” Knight said later. “We will never forget Jo.”
Asked whether he thought Cox’s death would affect how local people voted, he said: “The country paused after a very uncomfortable period of argument and exaggeration, if not untruth, and I hope that pause, though it has come about through such a tragic incident, will make people carefully think through the issues.”
Darren Playford, a 49-year-old plumber who witnessed the attack on Cox, had tears in his eyes at the vigil. “I’m still shaking to be honest. It’s been a living nightmare, the same as for everybody who witnessed it,” he said. “It’s one of those things you’re never going to forget.”
He said most people had probably made their minds up about which way they would vote before Cox’s death. “[The referendum has] just been the last thing on my mind to be honest. It’s taking second place for a lot of people here. At the end of the day somebody has lost a life, a mother with two young kids.”
Around the corner from the market square, the library and community centre outside which Cox was killed was serving as a polling station, and two police were stationed by the entrance. David Smith, the deputy returning officer in the area, said he had been nervous about using the building as a polling station so soon after the attack, but turnout so far seemed very high.
Fighting back tears, Smith said the count would bring back bittersweet memories of when Cox was elected as the constituency’s MP 13 months ago. “I work with politicians every day and they have a bad press, but everything they say about her is true,” he said.
Gwen Lowe, a Labour councillor for Batley West and a good friend of Cox’s, said many people in the local party had been too consumed with grief to follow the national party in turning its attention back to the referendum campaign. “Lots of us were very close to her, so she wasn’t just an inspirational MP or a good Labour colleague, she was our friend,” she said.
Sitting on a bench at Batley station, which a year ago was run down and had a leaking roof, Lowe recalled how Cox had got stuck into a project to renovate the building, personally planting many of the pots of flowers that sit on the platform, and pulling up weeds between the paving stones. “She was a mucker-inner was our Jo,” said Lowe. “She literally wasn’t afraid of getting her hands dirty.”
With its colourful mural of the town’s most celebrated landmarks – including the Fox’s biscuit factory, which sits just behind an ornate mosque – the station is now as picturesque as any and serves as one of many examples of the impact Jo Cox made on the lives of her constituents.
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