Speaking in the Assembly this morning Jim Allister said:
“This was a chilling and a gruesome murder that has robbed our nation of, what appears to have been, a very able and blossoming parliamentarian — our nation will be the poorer for that. It is an assault on the democratic process and, as a component of that, here, in this part of the Kingdom, we feel that too. Above all, this is the loss of a loving mother to two small children aged five and three, the same ages as my own grandchildren, and I can well imagine the unspeakable devastation of the loss of their mother. I am sure that each of us is thinking, first and foremost, of a grieving husband and bereft children at the hands of wickedness. Mr Nesbitt referred to the fact that we also have empathy, from past experience, when an MP from our own shores was gunned down doing the same public service as Jo Cox. Robert Bradford, while serving his constituents at a surgery, was brutally cut down by gunmen who have never been brought to justice. I trust that all who today empathise and express sympathy with Jo Cox have done all that they can to bring the murderers of Robert Bradford to justice. Some, in the past, have saluted and glorified in such terror. Last Thursday’s events are a salient reminder of how wrong that road is. I trust that there will emerge a respect for human life which, hitherto, some have not had and that this will not be a brutal killing that is misused, as some journalists have misused it, for political purposes.
“This is a tragedy beyond measure for Parliament and for family, and it should not be exploited beyond that.”