01 May 08
The dull one:Kia Picanto
Price: £5,995
The 1.0-litre Picanto could be the pick of the range.
First off, it sips fuel at the modest rate of 57.6 miles to every gallon and, secondly, it comfortably lives in the cheap Band B for VED with its clean-living 117g/km carbon dioxide emissions.
Of course performance suffers when compared with its fractionally more powerful 1.1-litre brother. It takes the 61bhp car continental-drift-rivalling 16.4 seconds to crack 60mph, but other than the slower acceleration, it's Picanto business as usual. The car is well built, tough and it's unlikely to break down, but even with the new smarter nose, it's still dreadfully dull.
But when you consider most people buying a Picanto regard it as an appliance anyway, perhaps that's not a bad thing.
