Vauxhall Insignia
The company car is back with a vengeance
There was a time when the latest Vectra or Mondeo was big news because in the days of company cars that’s what everyone seemed to be driving. The big Vauxhalls and Fords were also the cars banging doors in the BTCC on our TV screens every Saturday, but things have changed. These days it’s the Astra and Focus in the BTCC and your next-door neighbour is more likely to be hankering after an SUV, or something German, rather than an Insignia or Mondeo.
As a result, I have to admit that neither of these cars have been particularly on my radar, and consequently the new Insignia has been something of a revelation to me. First of all, it’s a seriously good-looking car, particularly in estate form with its swooping roofine and various creases, including the one running down the centre of the bonnet. Pick the VX-Line with its body kit and the 20-inch fve twin-spoke alloys (a £475 option), and you’ll struggle to fnd a better-looking family estate. Vauxhall has got its act together with the interior too – the layout is simple with everything exactly where it should be, and the quality is good as well. Perhaps not up there with the Germans just yet, but pretty good nonetheless. The brown Nappa leather interior on our test car shouldn’t work when everything else (including the exterior colour) is black, but for some reason it does. My only real complaint is that the satnav graphics are a little basic, but the same could be said for the Mondeo.
The Insignia isn’t by any stretch an out and out driver’s car – but you wouldn’t expect that. Instead, it ofers tidy handling and an excellent ride that will eat up those motorway miles efortlessly. It’s cheaper, bigger and more refned than its predecessor and, with a fve-star Euro NCAP rating, it ticks most boxes pretty well. Our test model might be a £27k car loaded with almost £8k worth of extras, but nonetheless, underneath all that is a car that is far more practical, capable and enjoyable than I had expected.