Sir Michael Parkinson pays tribute to 'good man and good mate' Harry Gration

Harry died earlier this month aged 71, causing a flood of tributes and memories from Yorkshire folk and beyond.

Sir Michael said it was the connection with Yorkshire folk that made Harry such a long-lasting success on Look North, a show he presented for 38 years.

The pair met on a book tour and became firm friends, and as part of Look North's continued tributes to Harry, the 87-year-old broadcaster said when he thinks about the friendship, he smiles.

"That's the nicest thing," he said. "I met Harry Gration because I was touring the country doing a book tour, and generally speaking when you do that you come across some good interviewers and some bad interviewers. Harry was one of the good ones and that's how it started.

"I had a great admiration for him of course, Yorkshire being my home county. We settled in very easily together. From that point on, we've developed a very good friendship which I've treasured and I was greatly saddened by his sudden death.

"He was a good man and a good mate."

Speaking about what made him such a big hit on the show, Sir Michael said it was the trust people had in him, which also connected him to Yorkshire.

"Trust is important.," he said. "Particularly if you're delivering the news to people and particularly in a county like Yorkshire where there's a very close relationship between the media and the Yorkshire folk, too.

"Yorkshire folk, when they want to be, can be difficult."

He also praised his professionalism, and thought back to his most recent meeting with Harry at a charity event in Yorkshire.

"I think he was just content to do a good job," Sir Michael Said. "Just to do a job with the people he loved, I mean he loved the Yorkshire tribe and all that. And that was part of everything he did and they loved him. And I think somehow that's the perfect summary of a very good man.

"As one journalist to another I admired him greatly - and not many journalists say that about other journalists.

"I was quite recently up in Yorkshire, doing a charity event as a guest of honour, and watching him in the crowd, working the crowd, doing the job, doing the hard yards, getting money for charity and all that, and I just thinking then how good he was at it and how fortunate I was to be his friend.

"Little realising that, what, three weeks later he died."

At the end of the video, a reporter asks Sir Michael if there's anything else he'd like to add, to which he replies: "Nope, except you owe me a lot of money for that, Harry."