Sorry,
but it seems I have done the man an injustice and I've apologised.
I emailed Alan last night & he has confirmed this morning that it was not his number as I had thought; I acted with the best of intentions (although I do realise that "The road to hell is paved with good intentions"); there are a lot of people out there who would take advantage & it seemed odd that the car still had a collectible number after years off the road, when it could have been sold, I'd sooner make a bit of a fool of myself than have a friend or fellow Lancisti conned.
I did try to check the DVLA site last night to confirm what was registered as having that number, but the system was down.
Here is the reply that I have received from him,
"this car has been in storage at my garage for a number of years and i have now been given the car for disposal i have the v5 and im to give the previous owner money for the car hope this helps"
Brian
8227