Batley and Spen MP, Joe Cox died after being shot and stabbed outside her constituency office by a man who shouted ”Britain first” before committing the gruesome murder.

Brendan Cox told the Andrew Marr show the killing had hit him and his wife’s two two young children “harder than anything could ever hit you”.

 Mr Cox made reference to the rise of US presidential hopeful Donald Trump, and prominent far-right French politician Marine Le Pen, as he pointed to an increased focus in recent months on “what divides us rather than what brings us together”.

He said: “There is something which is stirring that I think at the moment the political centre is too complacent about.”

 “I think part of it is about re-seizing a patriotic narrative.

“Britain has a long tradition of tolerance, of diversity, of being an outward-looking nation – it’s many of the things that made us a great country.

“But I feel we have ceded that narrative about patriotism, particularly to the extreme right, and I think we need to regain that narrative to define Britain in an inclusive way that brings it together rather than blames the migrant or the refugee or the Muslim for what might be going on in our country at any individual time.”

Expressing the heightened tension that attended the referendum, Cox told the Andrew Marr show that the referendum was clearly a moment of heightened tension and heightened debate and some of that sometimes got out of control.

Brendon Cox’s comments come a day after a youtube video went viral in Spain in which two Spanish people were assaulted in the UK. Cox is right in the sense that whilst patriotism has its obvious and necessary value, it should necessarily embody a reasonable level of tolerance and diversity which is a valued quality of any balanced society.

Tolerance and diversity do not mean a reckless lack of control over our borders, but it means understanding and accepting that development includes an understanding that some degree of diversity and inclusion is good for the economic and social makeup of every society. Patriotism is a positive thing when correctly balanced with other useful factors and principles.

This is what Brendon Cox seemed to be talking about in the Andrew Marr show. He doesn’t devalue patriotism, he just believes it should be taken from the extreme right. It was moving to hear him talk, considering the devastating experience he had in losing his wife in such a callous way. Brendan Cox spoke very intelligently, almost like a political statesman.

Making a country great means bringing the best out of that country by shaping the thinking of the people in a manner that inspires them to be their best, and use the best resources available from that country or other countries to achieve their highest individual goals which is also useful to the collective goals of the country.

Ultimately, every country should have control over their laws and should seek to look after its citizens. However, they must appreciate that some countries have more people who specialise in certain skills that may be useful to us if there is a shortage of those skills.

Every country is expected to try and develop and broaden their national skills, and this is high on the agenda in the UK. But we must retain the choice and discretion to use a valuable amount of foreign skill and man- power when it will be productive to do so. Brexit should only be taken to mean that the UK government will have full control over its laws and borders without reference to previous EU law capable of overriding our own laws.