BRENDAN Cox, the widower of Jo Cox, the Batley and Spen MP who was murdered in Batley by a far-right extremist in June 2016 during the EU referendum campaign, has said that he and his family were "incredibly proud" of Kim Leadbeater after her by-election win following a "bruising and pretty horrible campaign".

Labour's Ms Leadbeater, the sister of Jo Cox, took the Batley and Spen seat with 13,296 votes, a majority of 323 over Tory candidate Ryan Stephenson after a bitter contest.

"It's a big day, just on that personal level we're all incredibly proud of what Kim's done," he told the BBC.

"She was incredibly brave to step forward into it, not just around the security side of things given what happened to Jo but also the context, it was a very bruising and pretty horrible campaign at times.

"To put yourself into that and try and keep positive and try and keep a vision on what you want to change and how you bring people together I think she's done an amazing (job).

"Win or lose frankly we would have been just as proud of her."

Ms Leadbeater has said she hopes to heal the divisions in the constituency after a gruelling campaign.

"Sadly we have seen some nastiness during this by-election campaign and there are some divisions that need to be healed. I think that if anyone can achieve that I can," she told BBC Breakfast.

"I have conducted a very positive campaign. I have focused very much on the good people of Batley and Spen. I am incredibly grateful to the people of Batley and Spen for putting their trust in me.

"Sadly we have seen some poor behaviour. There have been situations where I have felt very intimidated.

"We have had some of our campaigners had things thrown at them and somebody has been arrested. There have been moments of real unpleasantness."

Mr Cox said that the majority of the by-election had been good natured but that several marginal candidates had sought to divide communities which was "easy to do in politics".

Speaking on the BBC he praised Ms Leadbeater for her focus on connecting people, which he said is "ultimately what got her over the line".

"There's a differentiation between kinder and still being able to have that lively, energetic, passionate debate and I think the majority of the campaign between the Conservative Party and the Labour Party was that," he said.

"It was about the ideas, about how you change things for local people, about who's the best candidate to do that.

"At the margins you have candidates that are focussed on dividing and splitting communities and it's very easy to divide people, that's the easy thing to do in politics.

"The difficult thing is, the poetry of politics, is how you bring them together.

"How do you manage to give people that hope and want people to connect with each other and their communities.

"I think that's what Kim focused on resolutely and I think ultimately that's what saw her over the line."

Jo Cox's husband said he had not yet woken up his children to tell them of Ms Leadbeater's victory but knew that they would be "incredibly excited" about the outcome.

"I haven't woken them up yet, I'm trying to keep them asleep for as long as possible so their energy levels don't dip too much during the day but they're going to be incredibly excited," he told the BBC.

"We had a call with Kim yesterday and just talking about, win or lose, how proud they were of her.

"They'll be incredibly excited. I'm just trying to put off the moment when they start bouncing around the house."

Ms Leadbeater said she hoped to do her sister proud as the new MP for Batley and Spen.

"It was a very big decision to put myself forward. It has been a very emotional campaign and today is very emotional for me for lots of reasons," she told BBC Breakfast.

"But if I can be half the MP Jo was I know I will do her proud and I will do my family proud."

Labour MP Jess Phillips, a close friend of Jo Cox, tweeted: "The emotional labour done by @kimleadbeater over the last few weeks is unimaginable. Hope and love can win but it is harder and takes considerably more work than hate which any fool can do."

Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn tweeted: "Well done @kimleadbeater. Now begins the process of bringing a fractured community together. I'm sure she'll make the people of #BatleyAndSpen proud - and that she will represent them all."