Scores of people gathered at Tunbridge Wells’ Millennium Clock on Friday evening for a candlelit vigil in memory of murdered MP Jo Cox.
Members of the public joined people from across the political divide to pay tribute to the Yorkshire MP, attacked outside the library where held her surgery.
Andrew Sharp, Chairman of the Tunbridge Wells Constituency Labour Party laid a white Yorkshire rose and led the tribute along with Vice Chair Carol Wilson, who also represented Tunbridge Wells’ Women’s Forum.
Stressing the importance of the kind of unity Jo Cox believed in, Andrew Sharp later told the Times: “It’s an enormous shame when our politics just goes too far and we start dividing the nation, we start dividing people.
“It’s fine to have a robust discussion but the kind of nasty personal politics that has crept into British politics is something that is very unwelcome, and I hope that out of respect to Jo that one of the things that will come out of all of this is that we step back and think about the way we conduct our politics, and to think about how we best represent people.”
Carol Wilson said: “I feel devastated and so angry that the reason I am having to do this is because of Jo’s death, because of her murder, not because of the many things she has been doing and would have continued to do in the future. And I feel so angry our democracy has been assaulted in that way.”
Local MP Greg Clark took the unusual step of holding his Saturday surgery in the open air in Calverley Road precinct to show that despite what happened he is determined to carry on being accessible to his constituents. He stood alongside his usual giant A-board bearing his picture saying: ‘Can I help?’
