Extraordinary response to funding page set up in memory of murdered MP
A fundraising page set-up to raise cash for charities in memory of murdered MP Jo Cox is expected to reach the £1m mark today.
The GoFundMepage took £500,000 on its first day when it was launched with the current total sitting at £812,000 two days after being launched.
Some 22,000 people have donated.
Charities which will benefit include The Royal Voluntary Service, to support volunteers helping combat loneliness in Cox’s constituency, Batley and Spen in West Yorkshire; HOPE not hate, which seek to challenge hate and extremism within local communities; and the White Helmets volunteer search and rescue workers in Syria.
The page was been created by Cox's friends in collaboration with her husband Brendan Cox.
Once funds are gathered they will be split between these causes which were chosen by her family.
We are just overwhelmed and grateful at the huge outpouring of support - Nick Grono
Her husband Brendan said: "Jo believed in a better world and she fought for it every day of her life with an energy, and a zest for life that would exhaust most people.
“She would have wanted two things above all else to happen now, one that our precious children are bathed in love and two, that we all unite to fight against the hatred that killed her.”
Nick Grono, the chief executive of the Freedom Fund, an organisation Jo worked for before becoming an MP, said: “The system was overwhelmed with the scale and speed of the donations and actually went offline for about an hour very early on.
“We are just overwhelmed and grateful at the huge outpouring of support that we’re seeing and which is taking the form of donations to the fund.”
Hundreds of messages of condolence have been left in the comments section of the page. Tony Delaney said: “I didn’t know her but it is obvious that she touched so many people in many parts of the world.
"We have lost a huge talent, a truly genuine and caring human being. I hope everyone can continue with her philosophy of love and not hatred. RIP Jo.”
The member for Batley and Spen was shot and stabbed on 16 June outside her constituency surgery in Birstall, West Yorkshire.
A 52 year old man has been charged with her murder.
