THERE is something odd about Lord Young’s desk. Perhaps only one person in a hundred would notice what is missing, on being shown into the London offices of Young Associates, his private investment vehicle.

The desk is green leather, trimmed with dark wood, not especially large for the man who once ran two of the biggest departments of state. There is a small screen and the usual executive clutter. It is only when he shows you the switches built into the far side, like hidden weapons in some Dr No-style fastness, that you realise.

Where is the computer? It is invisible, built into the desk by Powerdesk, which is by no coincidence one of the hi-tech companies into which Young has put his money. “I’m an early adopter,” he says, cheerfully.

“I don’t buy yachts. I don’t have any aircraft or big boys’ toys. I buy little boys’ toys. I bought the first Apple computer that came into this country. I rang Apple in California and they told me the first shipment was coming here. I went to the distributor and opened up one of the first boxes.”

He has rewired his house, first with cable and now with wireless technology. An iPod, a BlackBerry . . . It is a fondness reflected in his investment philosophy. Young Associates, “probably the smallest private equity house in London”, specialises in hi-tech start-ups with good cashflow.

“They’re under the threshold for even the small venture capital funds or private equity funds but too large for private investors.” Young often takes the chairman’s slot and is a hands-on investor — he has a dislike of the typical passive non-executive role. Three of his companies have floated on the Alternative Investment Market.

But now he has another project. On April 3, at the Cork Street Gallery, Melvyn Bragg will open the first public exhibition of Young’s photographs, taken on a trip to Antarctica last year. The photos are for sale for between £300 and £1,000, all proceeds going to the Prince’s Trust, with which he is heavily involved.

“I’ve been a photographer since I got a delayed bar mitzvah present, so I must have been 13 or 14,” he says. “I’ve had a darkroom ever since.”

Last summer he bumped into David Khalili, the noted art collector, and showed him the photos. “He said, ‘These are eminently saleable’.” Young arranged the exhibition.

“It’s a lifetime ambition. I’ve managed to change whatever I’ve done every five years of my life. I think the eighth decade is the right time to start a new career. To be a professional photographer is a great accolade for a politician” — he hurriedly corrects himself — “an ex-politician.”

Young, 74, now reckons to spend half his time on business and half on other activities, including pro bono work — as well as being in charge of the private sector fundraising at the Prince’s Trust, he is a past-chairman of University College London, his alma mater, chairs UCL’s newly founded Institute for Cultural Heritage and, when we meet, is rushing off to the Festival Theatre in Chichester, which he has been rescuing from financial collapse.

He has just returned from a holiday in the Galapagos and, with his wife, Lita, is off later this year on a nuclear-powered icebreaker heading for the North Pole. He will also be accompanied by his Nikon D200 digital camera.

Not surprisingly, Young took up digital photography five or six years ago, just as the cameras were becoming reliable, and has little time for the view, expressed by some traditionalists, that paper and chemicals are somehow better.

Times Recommends

• Lies and cover-up at MG Rover exposed by report
• High oil prices push manufacturing costs up
• Primark founder steps down as chief executive