PAUL Hockney used to be the little big man of Bradford's civic and political life. He was Lord Mayor of Bradford during the Queen's Silver Jubilee in 1977 and until May 1984 leader of the Liberal Group - the Liberal Alliance as it became - on Bradford Council.

Under six feet tall but with a big booming voice, he was Bradford's version of Brian Blessed - without the beard and the Thespian tendencies. That said his ability to galvanise all sorts of people and charge an atmosphere with a sense of energy and urgency made him the ideal civic head to front the metropolitan district's celebrations of the Queen's 25th anniversary.

Far from being in the shadow of his famous brother David, Paul Hockney was always his own man. The entire Hockney family - John, Paul, Philip, David and Margaret - were brought up to dare to be themselves and make their own way in the world.

He represented Idle at City Hall. The metropolitan district had only existed since April, 1974, so when Mr Hockney donned the Lord Mayor's tricorn hat, furry robe and chain of office, the organisation, with its plethora of directorates, committees, sub-committees and county council links, was still in its infancy. New civic improvements - the £17m transport interchange with its corrugated-style glass roof, the Magistrates Court and Central Library - gave the city an air of great expectations.

The Queen's Silver Jubilee could have been a stuffy affair, confined to civic dinners and VIP visits. The Lord Mayor took it out into the streets of Bradford and beyond, determined to make fun and fund-raising his priorities.

Less than two weeks into his year of civic office he asked pupils at Bradford Girls' Grammar School if they could knit him some more Union Jack socks for wearing at civic functions. The only two pairs he had required nightly washing. He also wanted the members of Bradford Schools Band to have a pair each for their performance at a civic do at Keighley's Victoria Hall.

Ilkley businessman Howard Scaife kindly obliged, providing the Lord Mayor with 70 pairs of red, white and blue footwear. The socks were just the start. Before the civic year was up the Lord Mayor and the Lady Mayoress, Mrs Jean Hockney, had inspired an entire fashion range of Jubilee gear: wellington boots, ties, braces, bow ties, pencils, button holes and cufflinks.

Apparel that proved surplus to requirements were sold to boost the mayoral Silver Jubilee Appeal: an outdoors activities centre on a 12-acre site at Nell Bank, Ilkley, a place where groups of inner-city children could escape inner-city life for a while. Such was the pull of the appeal the original target of £50,000 was soon passed. The final sum was £115,000. In today's monetary values that equates to £723,177.

The Jubilee year preceded the terrible winter of 1979 and the industrial recession that followed. The recession knocked the stuffing out of Bradford economically and socially into the late 1980s. Until May 1984, when Paul Hockney retired from the council, he was in the thick of it.

From 1982 until 1986, Bradford Council was run by a coalition of Conservatives and Liberals. The Labour Group, like Labour nationally, was undergoing an identity crisis, trying to reconcile conflicting priorities - the provision of basic services and promoting pro-Socialist policies.

The district was in the stranglehold of a housing crisis, long-term unemployment, which had reached 30,000, rate support reductions by the Thatcher administration in Westminster and the several local issues such as serving halal meat in schools and the Ray Honeyford Affair which polarised public opinion.

Another of those issues was what public money should be spent on. Should it go on economic development, for the encouragement of which the council had set up a special unit under Ian Page, or should much-needed funds be devoted to building houses? Thirty years ago the council's housing department under Jack Feather was still building houses.

Paul Hockney was well aware of the necessity of both houses and economic development; nevertheless he vigorously backed the proposed multi-million pound redevelopment of the Alhambra partly because it was a symbol of Bradford's enterprising modern history. That was a view not widely supported beyond the district's theatre-lovers.

Instead of following public opinion,however, Paul Hockney argued that a renovated Alhambra would have long-term benefits for the district's cultural reputation.

In March 1983 he came up with a proposal to put greatness into Bradford by means of the stratagem of changing the name of the authority from Bradford Metropolitan District Council to Greater Bradford City Council.

He said: "We cannot turn the clock back to pre-1974 when there were urban district councils. Greater Bradford City Council would give these old districts identity and show they are part of the council."

Bradford Chamber of Commerce liked the idea but preferred an even shorter title: Greater Bradford Council.

Paul Hockney left political life in May 1984 to concentrate on his work as an accountant, doubtless relieved to escape full council meetings that could go on for 11 hours or more - the record was more than 13 hours - with emergency packets of fish and chips rushed from Mother Hubbard's on Ingleby Road to sustain 90 elected members, plus officers and journalists, through the long cold watches of the night and early morning.

In April 1984, before the district council elections, the T&A summed up the position of the Liberal Alliance:-

"As for the Liberals, the loss of Paul Hockney is something the group will find impossible to make up. This is not to belittle Coun. Mrs Kath Greenwood, the leader designate. But Coun Hockney is a commanding personality in the thick of the political dogfight, with a loud voice and shrewd political brain.

"Without him it is hard to see how the Alliance group will be able to operate between the other two parties as well as it has done during the last two years."

Paul and Jean Hockney eventually moved to Flamborough, then to Baildon. They now live in Ilkley.