After nearly five years at the helm, Sir Graham Hall hands over the chairmanship of regeneration agency Yorkshire Forward to Terry Hodgkinson on December 12.

Business Reporter Andrew Hebden took a trip to the agency's Leeds headquarters to meet the man who has guided the powerful organisation in its formative years.

Sir Graham Hall leans across the table in his smart glazed office, a landscape of Leeds' booming city centre stretching out behind him.

The image of building cranes, stylish high rise office developments and the buzz of activity is a symptom of that city's rapid growth in the last five years.

Sir Graham speaks passionately about what has been achieved in his period as Yorkshire Forward chairman. But the success of Leeds rarely crops up. Instead it is the picture of Bradford, as painted in the visionary Master Plan, that excites him most.

Sir Graham has never been reluctant to nail his colours to Bradford's mast. He spent six months as chairman of the Urban Regeneration Company (URC) that he was so keen to see established, and was instrumental in securing a £20 million commitment from Yorkshire Forward to helping bring the Master Plan to reality.

His interest in Bradford's cause is not automatically obvious from his background. A miner's son from Doncaster, he rose rapidly through the ranks from electrician to chief executive at Yorkshire Electricity.

He was also chairman and vice chairman of the Confederation of British Industries (CBI) Yorkshire council before being appointed to his post at the new regional development agency for Yorkshire in 1999.

When he took up the role, he was literally entering the unknown. Confirmation of his appointment came with a trip to Number Ten, Downing Street, when Tony Blair said his application had been accepted. Before even having chance to think about the offer, he was whisked before a gaggle of press photographers and the mission had begun.

As the sole employee of the new organisation, Sir Graham soon found he had a challenge on his hands. Yorkshire Forward (as it later become known to the irritation of some opponents in Hull) merged the functions of many existing Government organisations. And that meant a big task in terms of staffing and organisation.

But, for Sir Graham, the key factor was to get a good chief executive and impose some of the lessons he had learned from the private sector on the new organisation. Top of the list was leadership - and it's proved a big task.

"I think the job itself and the leadership role has been much bigger than I expected," said Sir Graham. "There have been times when I've wondered what I have taken on. You cannot do the job in 12 hours and you can't do it in three days. All the MPs want to see you and each board member wants to see you. Sometimes, I am working 100 hours a week, but I get pleasure from it. The main thing is the fact that you know you are making a difference."

Sir Graham clearly takes pride in his achievements. He speaks bluntly and openly about the challenges Yorkshire has faced, but his overwhelming pride in the county is plain to see.

"I have come up from the shop floor and my dad was a miner," he said. "I have come up the hard way. The fact that I have made a difference to the lives of the people of this region - you can't put a value on that. I have got a passion for this job because places like Bradford have taken a lot of knocks over the years and what is happening there now is great to see."

He said the achievements over the past five years were too numerous to list. But he highlights the part played in winning permission for the new airport at Finningley, the £1.2 billion Yorkshire has secured for transport improvements, and the new regional strategy.

Not that it's been easy. A glance out of Sir Graham's window highlights the vast economic differences that exist in the region.

"If you were running a business, then you would tend to put money in where the success is," he said. "Alternatively, people might argue that we should invest in the least well off areas. But we have got to do something sensible in the middle.

"We took a knocking when we decided to put money into Barnsley. People said 'if Barnsley can have money, then why can't we?'. But they had an exciting, strategic plan that was capable of creating a paradigm shift. It is exactly why we set up the Bradford URC."

And Bradford is the place where Sir Graham thinks change is needed more than most. He doesn't hide his enthusiasm for the URC, now known as Bradford Centre Regeneration, and its chief executive Maud Marshall.

"If we keep doing what we have always done, then we will get what we have always got," he said. "You can't create a world class region without having a paradigm shift. That doesn't guarantee that everything contained in the Master Plan will happen, but we had to do something.

"I have always seen Bradford as a poor relation to Leeds, but never seen the reason for that. Maybe Bradford has not had the political stability and leadership that other cities have had. It needs shock treatment and that is why we were so keen to win approval for the URC. I decided that I would put six months of my time into Bradford and it is the only city where I have done that."

It is clear one of Sir Graham's proudest achievements of all was the sight of workmen finally moving in to the historic Lister's Mill complex in Manningham. He stressed it was Yorkshire Forward's investment which made the scheme happen.

"The mills have terrific potential," he said. "Just doing something like that has a huge effect in morale terms on the people who live and work around there. Seeing investment happening in that area can have such a tremendous impact."

And he is keen to point out he has fought Bradford's corner.

"We all have our opinions, but there was board support for me going into Bradford and they supported the £20 million investment in the Master Plan," he said. "When Maud Marshall came before the board she did really well and there was a real air of enthusiasm. They were convinced that something is happening in Bradford."

Sir Graham, now aged 60, retires from his post at Yorkshire Forward this month, to be succeeded by Skipton-born businessman Terry Hodgkinson, famous for building construction firm Lemmeleg. Sir Graham's planning a three-month sabbatical while he mulls over offers from the private sector.

But, whatever the future holds for the former Yorkshire Electricity chief, he guarantees two things: Yorkshire Forward will keep its commitment to Bradford and he will be more than an interested observer.

"I shall be visiting Bradford and keeping an eye on what happens there," said Sir Graham. "We have got to be visionary and we have got to be radical. The Master Plan has the potential to do that and put the 'wow factor' back into Bradford. We need to restore the 'can do' mentality because there's been a 'can't do' mentality for too long."

If Sir Graham's infectious enthusiasm has rubbed off on the leaders at the URC, then Bradford's future could be as bright as he predicts.