Out of control

I enjoyed it; comfortable front seats, easy ingress and egress, adequate space and bouncing along gives you a generally carefree happy drive. There’s some vibration and wind noise but not enough to bother about. Not a lot of power, of course, but it’s fine for pottering about, cruises contentedly at 70mph and returns 47.9 combined mpg. I never drove it in the rain and there were early reports that the driver’s mirror and window were easily obscured by spray, subsequently modified by a dealer-provided A pillar cover. Maybe they’ve sorted that out now.

But don’t rush out for one without sampling some of the competition first. The £7,095 Hyundai i110, for instance, with its excellent chain-cam Kappa engine, £35 tax, plentiful toys and tricks and five-year warranty. Or the 1.2 litre 55ps VW Fox I was sniffing around recently, at £6,740 a loss-leader to get newcomers into VW, well-finished, roomy and stylish with £120 tax and 46.3 combined mpg, though only three doors.

If entry-level motoring doesn’t ring the full peal for you, however, pop along instead to Southeran’s of Piccadilly before 19 June and pick up a bit of glamour from their In Pursuit of Pleasure exhibition of motoring and aviation posters, prints and books. Luxuriate there amid some great motoring art that, if it weren’t reproduced and featuring manufactured goods, would hang in galleries and cost 20 times as much. Or pick up the D-Type Jaguar for £10,000. All right, it’s a model but it’s solid silver and will no more depreciate than the real thing, unlike your Fabia.