The monarch's man

For 12 years as the Lord Lieutenant of Oxfordshire, Hugo Brunner has relished the job of introducing the Queen and her family to the county.

And his ability to put people at their ease, even in the company of royalty, has certainly been put to much use, given the frequency of royal visits here.

A seemingly normal week for him has just seen him accompany the Prince of Wales around a housing project in Bletchingdon and the Earl of Wessex to Abingdon, to celebrate the county's Duke of Edinburgh Award successes.

Standing respectfully behind the royals in his dark uniform and cap, silver sword close to his white-gloved hands, to many people Mr Brunner is the very embodiment of ceremonial support for the monarchy: dignified but unpompous, discreet, unflappable and above all approachable.

If anyone could claim to be the glue that holds the county together, it would surely be this Lord Lieutenant.

Only, as we all now know, it was wrong of us lazily to assume that this glue was permanent.

For earlier this month, Mr Brunner, who has been the Queen's representative in the county since 1996, announced that he is to retire. After attending or speaking at hundreds of ceremonial events, church services, awards, openings and annual general meetings, he will be standing down in August.

Provided that they have done ten years in the 'job', it seems the monarch will graciously, allow her Lord Lieutenants to go between the ages of 70 and 75.

"I will be 73 in August and I now have many family commitments, particularly our grandchildren, with five at the moment and two more to be born this year," Mr Brunner told me.

After a long career in publishing, he will also be able to focus again on a few book projects, such as publishing a collection of poems by the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Mr Brunner also knows better than anyone the potential pitfalls of going on too long as Lord Lieutenant of Oxfordshire.

He still delights in the story of his predecessor, the 7th Earl of Macclesfield, who fainted as the Queen was lunching in Trinity College in 1960.

The first sign of trouble was noted by Lady Hayter, wife of the warden of New College, whose diary records: "Lord Macclesfield was rather quiet and when I turned to him and saw his eyes closing and his colour changing, I realised he was ill. There was just time to get to him and help him to be lowered to the floor by the fireplace."

As college scouts loosened the Lord Lieutenant's uniform, Lady Macclesfield was alerted. But on overhearing the assessment of Professor Sir George Pickering, Regius Professor of Medicine ("I'm afraid he is a goner") she too passed out. Happily, both of them recovered before very long, with 72-year-old Lord Macclesfield able to resume his seat.

An aged college servant with a heavy tray then tripped up with a resounding crash. Later repairing to the senior common room after the lunch, the Queen reflected: "We've had a wonderful lunch - bodies all over the place."

When Mr Brunner reminded the Queen of the episode at his old college, she readily recalled the occasion and was even able to put him right about some of the details.

There have been no embarrassments to match that day, although he will tell you that at this year's Oxford Farming Conference at the Examinations Schools, he arrived to welcome the Princess Royal to find her already there.

She had, in fact, arrived early. But keeping up with the Queen's daughter has been something of a challenge as they move between engagements. At the wheel of her Bentley, she has a tendency to arrive at functions before the Lord Lieutenant, even when he leaves engagements early so as to be able to greet her at the next one. "The Princess Royal does like to move very quickly," he smiled. "I'm afraid she has got away without me on a few occasions."

Mr Brunner, however, is certainly not averse to adding places to royal itineraries. He still feels a glow of satisfaction that his intervention resulted in the Queen going to Berinsfield, one of Oxfordshire's less affluent housing estates, following a visit to that bastion of educational privilege on the other side of Abingdon, Radley College.

He said: "In a way, I think it complemented the visit to Radley. I think advising her to go to Berinsfield was the best thing that I ever advised the Queen to do. It proved a really important event, generating national interest."

He was also pivotal in ensuring that the Queen visited the £260m Diamond Light Source laboratory at Harwell, near Didcot, last year.

Promoting innovation and business has always been one of his great passions.

"Oxfordshire is an outstanding area in terms of innovative industry and high-tech companies. As Lord Lieutenant, I have been fortunate to be able to connect with these amazing enterprises."

In an average week he will go to about ten functions, though sometimes as many as three in a day. "I'm lucky to get to see every corner of life through being invited to go to so many things."

After paying tribute to the time-keeping skills of Mavis Shepheard in the Lieutenancy office at County Hall, Mr Brunner is soon talking enthusiastically about a whole series of projects: an Asian group in Banbury, a carers' forum and the Oxford Gatehouse drop-in centre, with which his wife Marie Rose is closely involved.

His own upbringing was privileged but Liberal, with a markedly capital L.

Educated at Eton, Mr Brunner was the fifth son of Sir Felix Brunner, an industrialist who went on to become president of the Liberal Party.

Lady Brunner, his mother, was the redoubtable chairman of the National Federation of Women's Institutes and founder of the Keep Britain Tidy Group. She died only five years ago, living to the ripe old age of 98.

In 1937, the family moved to Grey's Court near Henley, one of the region's most picturesque houses, with 14th-century fortifications and ornamental gardens set within Medieval walls. By a nice twist of fate, Mr Brunner's boyhood home, was once the house of Sir Francis Knollys, who was Oxfordshire's first Lord Lieutenant in Elizabeth I's reign. Grey's Court was later handed by the family to the National Trust.

At one point in his life, Mr Brunner looked ready to emulate his great-grandfather by becoming a Liberal MP, and twice unsuccessfully fought for the Torbay seat - in 1964 and 1966.

He well remembers campaigning in Devon, particularly the day he was taken to sea by a fishermen's representative. It was an especially nasty day. Ending up biliously hanging over the side, he was told in no uncertain terms: "Look you're supposed to be discussing the fish, not feeding them."

How he would have fared in the rough old trade of politics is something to ponder, but it is a fair bet that he would have been closer to Joe Grimond than 'The Beast of Bolsover', Dennis Skinner.

Instead, he was to pursue a distinguished career in publishing, holding senior positions with many publishing houses, including Oxford University Press and Chatto & Windus, where he eventually became chairman.

Author Jeremy Lewis, who joined him at both companies, summed up Mr Brunner's character in a volume of his autobiography Kindred Spirits. He wrote: "Hugo was the kindest, the most unpolitical and the least cynical of men, always eager to believe the best of those about him and too convinced for his own good that reason and goodwill would prevail in the end. He was an excellent and under-rated publisher, enthusiastic, literate and much liked by his authors, encouraging and helpful for those who worked for him, insistent on high standards, unfashionably sensible about such matters as advances and print runs."

As Lord Lieutenant, this business acumen has been applied to various good causes. Under his chairmanship of the Dorchester Abbey Campaign more than £3.25m was raised toward the restoration of one of the county's greatest buildings.

He was a prominent figure behind the Oxfordshire Independent/State Schools project, the only county-wide bridge-building project, and oversaw completion of the Oxfordshire Jubilee Wildlife Spaces project.

One of the lasting legacies of his Lord Lieutenancy is Oxfordshire's blue plaque scheme, which recognises buildings that housed Oxfordshire's good and great.

Since launching the scheme, more than 30 plaques have gone up. He has a long list of blue plaques he wants to see in place before he retires, including homes of C.S. Lewis, Prof Hans Krebbs and General Sir Montagu Stopford, who received the Japanese surrender at the end of the Burma campaign.

Recognising the importance of the armed forces in the county has always been viewed as one of the Lord Lieutenant's most important duties by Mr Brunner.

As the Queen's representative, he has also stood at Brize Norton as the bodies returned from Iraq. Organising the service to mark the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War is probably the event that has given him deepest pleasure, he told me.

"I've met many wonderful people who fought in the Second World War, not forgetting William Stone, aged 107, who fought in the First World War."

The old soldiers will surely miss the Lord Lieutenant, when he finally hangs up his sword. But, then, who, from the Queen downwards, will not?