"I just burst into tears, it was surreal," said Stefan Simmonds reflecting on the moment he heard Jo Cox had died.

Mr Simmonds owns several West Yorkshire business centres, including one in which the MP ran her constituency office in the town of Cleckheaton following her election last year.

"I saw her every couple of weeks. She was very talkative, very approachable and extremely impressive as a politician. Jo was incredibly popular in the town," he said.

Mr Simmonds and Mrs Cox had discussed Labour's antisemitism crisis in the past few months and the businessman said he had sent her JC articles about party members who had been suspended.

"She was very open-minded and even-handed in these discussions, as she was with all minorities. She listened," he said.

A member of the Beth Hamidrash Hagadol Synagogue in Leeds, and Harrogate Hebrew Congregation, Mr Simmonds is the father of Sky News presenter Samantha Simmonds, who announced Mrs Cox's death on air last Thursday afternoon.

"How very ironic that this heartbreaking news should come to me in this way," Mr Simmonds said. "Samantha said she found the announcing of this heinous act one of the most difficult things she had ever had to do."

Another of Mr Simmonds' business centres is a few hundred yards from where Mrs Cox was attacked.

He said: "One of my clients heard the shots and he said he will never forget the sound. There are a lot of those stories. It's gut-wrenching."