First drive: Toyota iQ - Buying and owning

The iQ will be priced from around £10,000, making it distinctly expensive for a city car.

However, the 1.0-litre manual model is exempt from road tax because it emits less than 100g/km of CO2. It also averages an impressive 67.3mpg.

Toyota is marketing the iQ as a premium product, and the interior on the pre-production car we tried looked smart at first glance.

Unfortunately, a closer inspection revealed a lot of hard plastics and some switchgear that’s been borrowed from the regular Yaris supermini.

At least Toyota has an excellent reliability record, and has consistently performed well in the annual JD Power customer satisfaction survey, so the iQ should be trouble-free to own.

What's more, every iQ comes loaded with safety kit. You get stability control and nine airbags as standard, including one that inflates across the rear screen in the event of a rear-end shunt.

Deadlocks and an integrated stereo make life difficult for thieves, although it’s a pity there’s no parcel shelf to hide the contents of the boot.