Our New Car Awards winners prove many great models are now more affordable than ever
With many of our award winners costing less than £36k, Mike Rutherford wonders why anybody would consider more expensive rivals that just aren’t as good
Have new cars for real-world drivers ever been better, more versatile, efficient, safe and fit for purpose? Not in my lifetime. As this week’s Auto Express New Car Awards clearly demonstrate, there’s nowt wrong with the current crop of state-of-the-art showroom products.
Follow our unbiased advice, do your homework, be open-minded, factor in discounts and insurance groups plus likely resale values, then draw up your personal list of the very best models in the price category you’re working within. Only then will your contender cars reveal levels of excellence and quality that consumers on limited budgets (that’s most of us) could only dream about in the recent past.
We used to be content with cars that were merely good or, occasionally, very good. Now, some great models are within our financial reach. A car doesn’t necessarily have to be big, quick, expensive and outrageously good-looking to qualify as a modern great. The Renault 5 E-Tech, winner of our Affordable Electric class, proves my point. Think top speed of 93mph, a more than reasonable sub-£24k starting price, plus a design that’s unapologetically understated, not tastelessly tacky. Not by coincidence, its longer, taller, more spacious big bro, the classless sub-£27k Renault 4, is officially commended in the same EV category – in addition to topping the Small SUV league.
I’ve no doubt that Fiat would not have priced its Grande Panda range so attractively had its Stellantis Group sibling rival Citroen, plus its external enemy Renault, cheekily ‘incentivised’ it to do so with provocatively low pricing for, respectively, the C3 and R5.
When I attended the 1989 launch of the original Mazda MX-5, I knew and predicted that it’d be a hit for decades to come. Some 36 years later it has again been crowned as the Convertible class winner. Officially, prices are from £28k. But with zero per cent finance and discounts averaging £3k-plus, it’s as affordable now as it was then.
Talking of affordability, decent petrol-electric cars don’t come much cheaper than the sub-£19k MG3, which picks up the Affordable Hybrid prize. This latest victory for the Chinese manufacturer should be yet another wake-up call for the likes of VW which, inexplicably, still drags its heels in bringing hybrid tech to buyers with limited budgets.
But it’s Skoda that can consider itself the serial champ this year. Wins for Octavia (Family Car), Superb (Estate), Elroq (Mid-size SUV) and Kodiaq (Large SUV) were impressive enough. But the much-coveted Car of the Year gong for the Elroq is the icing on the cake.
Our awards do feature some more pricey picks, but all of the cars mentioned in this column can be had, brand new, for between about £19,000 and £36,000. All are credible, appropriately priced and world-class. Why buy lesser, sometimes more expensive rivals that aren’t?
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Great leasing deals on our award winners
Skoda Elroq
Tesla Model 3
Fiat Grande Panda
Skoda Octavia
MG Motor UK MG3
Mazda Mx-5
Volvo Ex30
