A Labour MP has been shot and stabbed while meeting her own constituents in West Yorkshire.
The Daily Mail reports that Jo Cox, the MP for Batley and Spen, was attacked while meeting with locals in Birstall close to Leeds.
Eyewitnesses have said the mother-of-two was left ‘bleeding on the pavement’ after the brutal incident.
Ms Cox was airlifted to Leeds General hospital where it’s said she’s in a ‘serious condition’.
Daniel Blyth, a local business man, told the Yorkshire Post:
I saw seven police cars racing up Leeds Road towards Morley. They were unmarked BMWs.
There are two helicopters flying overhead. It all seems very dramatic. I have heard that two people have been shot but I’m not who are why. It’s all very unusual for Birstall.
According to Sky News, it’s also being reported by eyewitnesses that the attacker, who looked to be in his 60s or 70s, shouted ‘Britain First’ before attacking.
Hichem Bren-Abdallah, who was on the scene, says he saw people rushing down to the library where she held her Constituency surgeries, when he heard two shots.
He claims to have seen a man wearing a ‘dirty white baseball cap’ who began ‘jostling with somebody’.
Bren-Abdallah said:
It looked like a gun from, I don’t know, the First World War or a makeshift, handmade gun. It’s not sort of like the kind of gun you see normally.
UPDATE: Police are now reporting that armed officers attended the scene and arrested a 52-year-old man for the shooting.
Cambridge graduate Cox is a staunch supporter of remaining in the European Union and is a vocal proponent of Britain taking in more refugees.
More of a concept than a journalist, Tom Percival was forged in the bowels of Salford University from which he emerged grasping a Masters in journalism.
Since then his rise has been described by himself as ‘meteoric’ rising to the esteemed rank of Social Editor at UNILAD as well as working at the BBC, Manchester Evening News, and ITV.
He credits his success to three core techniques, name repetition, personality mirroring, and never breaking off a handshake.