THE Vauxhall Agila was built in the same Polish factory as the Suzuki Splash an the two cars are basically the same.

Most Vauxhalls and Fords are now sadly built outside Britain and Sunderland-built Nissans and Swindon-built Hondas have way more British content.

The Agila is a five door city car that's roomy and flexible on the inside, with fold-flat back seats giving the capacity of a small van.

It's available with a 1.0- litre petrol engine, which has either 64 or 68bhp and a 1.2 with either 83 or 92bhp. There is also a 1.3-litre diesel with 73bhp.

All versions have front wheel drive and a five-speed manual gearbox and the Agila seems to be very good value secondhand.

Though it's a city car, it's bigger and more practical than others like the Ford Ka and the Fiat 500, making it a lot more useful.

The 1.0-litre engine is only just man enough, taking nearly 15 seconds to reach 60mph, but the 1.2 is perky and nippy and gives little away in economy.

Comfort is pretty good over most surfaces, refinement is fair and road holding safe and sure.

There is good all round vision and there is good head and legroom - even in the back.

While it may not be a mini- MPV, the Agila has a lot of the elements of a people carrier that help to make it very practical.

It's tall-sided styling frees up plenty of headroom for passengers and also adds to the amount of load space.

The boot is a reasonable size to begin with and it can be extended by dropping down the 50/50 split and tip rear seat.

Some will also come with the option of the DualFloor, which gives additional storage space under the boot floor.

The entry model is the Expression and it comes with real ‘Post Office' spec. This means manual windows, power steering and a folding rear seat, but not the split/fold one other models.

The S model improves this with central locking, and electric front windows and door mirrors, but you have to choose the sub-level S A/C to get air con.

The SE adds alloy wheels, but you still only get four airbags and no stability control. These are serious omissions when the equivalent Suzuki gets six airbags and ESP.

Pay about £4,750 for a '13 13-reg Agila 1.0 S or £5,500 for a '14 14-reg S AC