Leader comment: EU debate is about more than identity politics

The murder of MP Jo Cox came amid bitter EU debate rhetoric

More than five months have passed since the UK voted in a historic referendum to leave the European Union.

Yet the partisan rhetoric has barely subsided. Furious dispute has raged over the credibility – or lack of it – of economic forecasting.

But far more worrying have been the incidents of racist and xenophobic attacks, the most outrageous of these being the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox who was shot and stabbed multiple times in her constituency.

Now the Equality and Human Rights Commission has called on Westminster party leaders to tone down campaigning that has “polarised” the country and “legitimised hate”. It spoke of growing concern that the divisions on a range of big questions “are widening and exacerbating tensions in our society” and pointed to the killing of Arkadiusz Jozwick as a manifestation of racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic attacks, together with reports of hijabs being pulled off, all of which it described as “stains on our society”.