FORD has abandoned its plans to import Lincoln cars from the US. Following the manufacturer's 1998 decision to scrap the Scorpio, it had long been expected that Ford would return to the executive car sector with the Lincoln in the final quarter of this year.

However, Fleet NewsNet has learned that following Ford's acquisition of Volvo to fill the niche between its own range and that of sister company Jaguar, the Lincoln range will not appear in Britain. Apart from the Volvo acquisition, which sees a number of models fit between the Ford Mondeo and the Jaguar S-Type in the Ford Motor Company product line-up, the manufacturer may also have learned from General Motors' decision to import the Cadillac into the UK. On sale for about a year the Cadillac has struggled to make an impression.