What Car? Q&A - Which small cars can my son afford to ru

Q: I have been trying to find a list of cars with small engines to insure for my 17-year-old son. It will be his first car and my understanding is that the smaller the engine, the lower the insurance group.

Although I recommended he buy an older car, he is still thinking of buying a nearly new car and is getting quotes of £2000-£3000 for third party fire and theft coverage on an 18-month-old base-model Citroen C2.
Ian MacFarlane

A: The cheapest cars to insure are not simply those with small-capacity engines. Security features, safety systems and the cost of repair are key components of the insurance group rating, so newer cars can often be cheaper to insure than older ones.

You can find the insurance groups of all new cars on whatcar.com or in the Buying Guide section of any What Car? magazine. New cars in the Group 1 insurance bracket include:

Chevrolet Matiz
Citroen C1 1.0i
Citroen C2 1.1i
Fiat Panda 1.1 Active
Peugeot 107
Skoda Fabia 1.2
Toyota Aygo
Toyota Yaris 1.0 VVT-i
Vauxhall Corsa 1.0i
Volkswagen Fox 1.2

Another way to reduce the costs of insuring younger drivers is to try 'pay as you drive' schemes offered by Norwich Union (www.norwichunion.com) and More Than (www.morethan.com).

They use satellite tracking to calculate the monthly insurance premiums based on when and where the car is driven, and penalise drivers financially if they drive at night when the risk of accidents is far higher.

You could also try Young Marmalade (web www.youngmarmalade.co.uk), a specialist insurer for young people, whose insurance is linked to specially selected new cars.