He wears his hair in a ponytail, sports a goatee beard, smokes 100 a day, lives on coffee and Lucozade, and has the sharpest brain of any businessman in the North of England.
 Brooks Mileson (pictured above), qualified accountant and formerly of Pennywell in Sunderland, is also one of the richest men in the region. He owes his wealth not just to the Albany Group, the insurance business that he sold earlier this year for £36m, but to the words he uses most frequently - integrity, loyalty, family, logic and common sense. His relationships have been built up over years of fairness and respect, whether it's in his personal life or by being honest in the business dealings which have embraced construction, property renovation and investment, finance, road traffic accident insurance, legal and medical claims and car hire. He also has a soft spot for grassroots - and struggling - football clubs; he rehabilitates badly-treated animals and does as much as humanly possible to help abused children. A caffeine-fuelled, Marlboro addict who sometimes forgets to eat (and would smoke more if he could stay up longer), could be regarded as a one-off. Brooks certainly is, but he sees himself simply as the only lad he knew in Pennywell who went to grammar school and whose parents worked all hours for the educational benefit of the family. After selling Albany, he retained the road traffic accident part of the empire and now operates as Arngrove from offices at Belmont Business Park in Durham. "Business is about people - the right people - and relationships," he says. "We are very much a family company, I'm very close to my staff and a lot of them have been with me from the beginning. The term 'mister' doesn't exist in any of my companies - it's all first names - and nothing's about money with me. "When I get involved in something, I really get involved; I see it as a challenge and I'm always looking for new opportunities. I've been very lucky with staff but I never forget I'm one of them as well - plus we're the first road traffic accident company to gain Investors In People and I'm very proud of that." When Brooks was 11 years old he was involved in a serious accident that had medical experts convinced he wouldn't walk again. "We were playing in a sand quarry - daft lads' things - and we decided to have an avalanche," he says. "I broke my back and dislocated my hips. I taught myself to walk again and had to wear built-up shoes because of my hips. Then, when I was told, 'you'll never be on the sports team', I thought, 'nobody's going to tell me what to do'." So, Brooks ran. And ran - until he won a bronze medal at the 1967 English cross-country junior championships (now the world cross-country championships), then stopped. "It was the happiest day of my life," he says. "I hated every minute of running, but I had something to prove." Point proven; nobody tells Brooks Mileson what he can and can't do. He now collects football clubs in much the same way as he gathers stricken animals on his front lawn. He is the president of Whitby Town FC; chairman of Gretna Town; he invests heavily in Carlisle United; he sponsors the Northern Football League (and is contracted to do so after his death, then through his children's lives after that); he sponsors Workington by providing the means to buy players, and is casting a paternalistic eye over Penrith FC. His Ark-load of animals range from donkeys, parrots and emus to wallabies, reas and horses, and he is building flats in Romania as a half-way house for youngsters newly out of orphanges. "I invest in sports, football mainly," he says. "It's my way of giving something back. My wife says, 'Go on, bring another one in'." It's Brooks' involvement with Gretna in the Scottish Third Division that has been taking up his time lately - and grabbing a few headlines for turning the club full-time and having plans drawn up for a new stadium. "This is my second season with the club - I live only eight miles away and I had never even been into the town," he says. "We've got a great team spirit. They were about to go out of business and I thought it would be fun to make them full-time and take them into the Scottish Premier League. We're now the highest goalscoring team in Europe." Top-scorer, Kenny Deuchar, is actually a doctor and is playing out his one-year qualification period before he decides on stethoscope or studs. Brooks believes that sport is a powerful tool in sending out a message to the community. "We're involved in the Sport Against Drugs campaign and take a stand against racism with community projects to get the kids off the streets," he says. "We now have one of the biggest community-related football academies in Scotland - bigger than Rangers and Celtic." Brooks is a committed Christian - his parents were Salvationists - and his integrity even reaches into paying his own way into matches. His loyalty streak is apparent by offering key staff a stake in the company. "It's what business is all about," he says. "It's people who make the business work; you've got to treat people how you expect to be treated. We're all about loyalty and fairness and if people don't respect you they won't work with you. "And, I always try to be honest with people. My integrity and my word are very important to me and we've never ripped anybody off. It's common sense - they'll come back again and recommend you to others. "I'm not a pin-striped, red braces sort of person, either. You never forget your roots." Brooks may fall for the charms of a dilapidated football stadium, but those sort don't run successful companies by being foolish. On the few ocacasions he has been taken for a ride, he reacts. "Everybody has to make a cock-up sometime," he says, "and if they do, I'll call them a knacker. But if I call them a bull's knacker then they know that's the finish." Brooks has only one kidney as a result of his accident ("and that operates at 50pc") and also has ME, which he admits is horrendous. "The worst thing you can do with that is give in," he says. Integrity, loyalty and fairness may be favourite words and we've obviously misheard that last remark. "Give in" simply doesn't exist in the Brooks Mileson vocabulary. | 
