Senior Lecturer in Journalism Kate Ironside attended the seminar on Xenophobia, Populism and the Media at Pembroke College, Cambridge, where Mrs Cox had been a student.

Ms Ironside was part of a panel of speakers including Pembroke Master and former cabinet minister Lord Smith, political journalist Jon Smith and Cambridge academic Leonie de Jongh.

She posed the fundamental question: Which comes first – the xenophobic media or the xenophobic reader? She then explained how xenophobic narratives can be embedded in the most innocuous of news stories.

“I was delighted to take part in this timely discussion on one of the profound challenges affected the media today.”

Mrs Cox was killed outside her constituency surgery in Birstall, West Yorkshire, in June last year.