Ex-Imperial chief buys nuclear base

Lincoln Fraser, the controversial former chief executive of the collapsed Imperial Consolidated finance group, has bought a once top-secret RAF nuclear base in East Anglia as the flagship of his new business ventures.

Mr Fraser, 31, who is banned by the DTI from holding company directorships, has launched plans to redevelop the massive RAF airbase at Faldingworth in Lincolnshire – once a major Cold War site housing deep nuclear bunkers and storing H-bombs.

Mr Fraser, who bought Faldingworth from BAE Systems for an undisclosed sum, has applied to the local authority for planning permission to build 13 new buildings on the site and convert it into a "facility for the storage of military and humanitarian aid equipment".

Mr Fraser is just one of a number of senior executives who moved onto new business ventures before the collapse of Imperial Consolidated. Founders of the Lincolnshire-based Imperial offshore finance group, Mr Fraser and Jared Brook resigned in April 2001 after several months of controversy.

In July 2001, the Department of Trade & Industry applied to ban them from holding directorships for four years over the earlier bankruptcy of a Morecambe hotel.

Last month, Imperial Consolidated went into administration owing up to £200m.

The administrators for Imperial Consolidated are in the process of identifying the failed group's assets. It now appears that at least 50 per cent are held as mining rights in Argentina and South Africa.

Mr Fraser and Mr Brook are now operating as a partnership based in Grimsby and have told local reporters they have interests in the leisure industry. They are seeking to develop the RAF Faldingworth base through a business called Unibay.

In a letter to West Lindsey District Council, Mr Fraser and Mr Brook say the redevelopment promises "important economic and investment developments for the area".

Mr Fraser told the local newspaper that his plan largely involved medical equipment, such as field hospitals and ambulances. "You only have to look at what is happening around the world to see that there is a lot of call for military field hospitals," he said.

A West Lindsey Council spokesman said the application is under consideration and would come before their planning committee later this summer.