John Sheard casts his eye over the General Election candidates for the Skipton and Ripon Constituency

HE'S a big fellow, as you would expect from the rugby player he once was. His tight curled hair is pure white and he speaks quickly, with authority. He seems like a guy who can get things done.

And he can. In Ripon that is. In Skipton and Craven, he is still a bit of a mystery.

His career as a politician is, to say the least, odd. He started as a Tory in one of the most rabidly Labour areas in Britain, then quit for the best part of a quarter of a century, only to emerge as a Lib-Dem North Yorkshire county councillor as recently as 1999.

His early political career was concerned with taking on great odds. He became a Tory councillor in Cardiff at the age of 22 - in the South Wales of socialist fire-eaters like Nye Bevan, Michael Foot and, later, Neil Kinnock.

However, he got married to his wife Linda, they had two sons, and politics lost its charm. So he took to business in a big way and eventually became a director of Wolseley Hughes Plc whose headquarters were in Ripon. The company is now part of Plumb Centre, the world's biggest plumbing and heating multi-national.

That was in 1978 and the arrival of the family in North Yorkshire saw the launch of a remarkable career which had absolutely nothing to do with politics. Somehow, Bernard managed to create, side by side, the life of a successful international businessman and that of a local voluntary worker - and the latter was to yield great goodies for the good burghers of Ripon.

On the business side, he helped create the World Plumbing Council which, mundane as it sounds, has provided long-term benefits for many Third World countries.

The council works closely with the World Health Organisation to install safe water supplies and drainage systems in some of the world's poorest countries and, in 1988, he was awarded an MBE for services to industry.

Now Ripon already had a pretty safe water supply but Bernard's efforts have attracted goodies which - I am sad to say - will be looked upon with some envy by Skiptonians and other Craven citizens.

Apart from working with the Cheshire Homes charity group and local young farmer's clubs, Bernard is a life-long supporter of the YMCA. As chairman, he succeeded in the immensely complex task of getting the YMCA appointed as a housing association. This allowed them to convert old properties into 20-odd flats for homeless youngsters, facilities which have now been used by hundreds of young people, many of them victims of physical or sexual abuse.

But more was to come. In 1997, Bernard became the first chairman of the Ripon City Partnership, a strictly non-political body (although sitting MP David Curry, Bernard's now arch-rival, is also a member).

The result: the tiny city won a Government regeneration grant worth £3 million, which is now being spent on no less than 28 different projects to make Ripon a better place to live.

Skipton folk, who have singularly failed to win grants for such things as a new swimming bath at Aireville or re-development of the Skipton RFC clubhouse, might be tempted to drool when they read the menu of some of these projects.

They include a new arts centre with theatre and cinema, a new technology park, the re-development of the old Ripon St John's college campus as a centre for distance learning, and a new hotel.

They are also talking with Rail Track about the possibility of re-opening the long closed Leeds-Ripon-Northallerton railway line.

And, on top of all that, Bernard was also responsible of setting up farmers' markets on Ripon's ancient market square - now temporarily suspended by foot and mouth - and Bernard gets up at 7am on a Sunday morning to help erect the stalls!

"The idea behind all this is long term thinking for the benefit of the community," he says. "All these projects, and particular the talks over the rail link, are very much focused on the future."

That remark may well be read and inwardly digested by some of our civic leaders in Craven. But, over Bernard Batemen, there still hangs the question: having achieved so much outside politics, why has he jumped back into the ring - and this time flying different political colours?

He thinks carefully before answering: "The fact is that I don't like the present Tory party and I cannot abide William Hague. He sacked one of my close friends, Peter Temple-Morris MP, because of his pro-European views and Peter went off to join the Labour party.

"Now I couldn't possibly do that. But I should point out that although my family were arch-Tories when I was young, in the 19th Century they had been part of the great Welsh Liberal tradition, people who tempered the rigours of the Industrial Revolution with a deep sympathy for ordinary working folk.

"Perhaps I have come back to my ancient roots."