Bradford’s Business Personality of the Year stepped into the breach at the last minute to address a gathering of around 90 West Yorkshire property and construction specialists.

Andrew Mason, managing director of Shipley-based Newmason Properties, urged his specialist audience to ensure that new-build and refurbishment projects were sustainable and long-lasting.

Recalling the Native American doctrine of the ‘seventh generation’, he said it meant considering whether decisions made today would affect descendants seven generations into the future.

Mr Mason, a former chairman of the Bradford Property Forum, said that great buildings, like great works of art, needed time to be enjoyed and be proud of. This was a key philosophy in the work of Newmason Properties, which developed the award-winning Victoria Mills conversion in Shipley.

Mr Mason, who was recognised at the Bradford Means Business awards earlier this year, was speaking to a construction industry lunch staged jointly by Bradford and Leeds chambers of commerce at the Cedar Court Hotel, Bradford.

He was standing in for Cal Bailey, director of Ilkley-based building services group N G Bailey, who pulled out due to illness.