Honda Civic Type R: Honda's new hot hatch for OAPs

Would suit Stirling Moss
Price on the road £17,600
Performance 146mph, 0-60mph in 6.6 seconds
Combined fuel consumption 31mpg
Further information 0845 200 8000

Honda is beset by biddies, and it wants rid of them. It's hardly surprising; an over reliance on the grey pound was a major element in Rover's demise and it is true that no car company wants to be lumbered with an ageing demographic - it's not good for either long-term sales or one's image. The trouble is, you can't actually ban oldsters from your showrooms; aside from the human-rights issues and obvious close calls (what if Helen Mirren rolls up with a down payment for a Jazz?), it would be a public-relations disaster. Esther Rantzen would be all over television quoting her face off; the cast of Last of the Summer Wine would be disinterred to picket the Swindon factory; and the Telegraph letters page would be inundated by "Angries of Eastbourne".

So Honda tried a different approach to rid itself of its pesky pensioner plague. It designed a car that was outlandishly adolescent and preposterously futuristic in the - it turns out, vain - hope that the OAPs of Great Britain would throw their tartan rugs in the air in disgust, climb aboard their Stannah Stairlifts, and ride off to their nearest Vauxhall dealer instead. Unfortunately, no one told the old people they weren't wanted at Honda anymore, and so you still see them, driving around in their ridiculous new Civics, liver-spotted knuckles framed by wisps of white hair just visible above the steering wheels, trailing miles of frustrated road users in their 24mph wake as they scatter pedestrians while rummaging for boiled sweets in the glove box.

They are, it seems, a loyal bunch, the elderly (how else do you explain the continued success of BHS in-store restaurants?). Merely styling your car to look like a character from Toy Story was never going to be enough to deter them, especially those with bifocals.

Enter the Civic Type R.

The Type R is supposed to be the hooligan of the Honda range, with its black mesh grills, 18-inch alloys and body kit. It has a wonderfully free-revving, easy-breathing VTEC engine that begs you to snickety-snack up and down the six-speed gear box to keep it on song, and sings an electrifying, raspy tune of its own, as you do, right up until an astonishing 8,000rpm (I remember the days when 8,000rpm was the preserve of Lamborghinis - and most of them only managed it once before going bang). It really is a terrific car, but dig a little deeper and you can't help but wonder if Honda really does want to ditch its antediluvian demographic after all. Might there still be some residual affection for its prime market? Could it be that Honda simply can't help designing cars with its mum's whist club in mind? Or is it the company's 73-year-old president, Takeo Fukui, it is trying to please? You see, the new Type R is a quieter, more refined and user-friendly machine than the old one. It only produces 1bhp more than the standard model and Honda has replaced the old car's independent rear suspension - which was costly but is pretty much an essential hot-hatch component these days - with a torsion beam setup originally refined by Ben Hur's pit crew. The ride is comfy and mature, soaking surface bumps with a pleasing springiness; the steering isn't nearly as much of a handful as it can be in other lightweight, front-wheel drive performance cars; and - most telling of all - the seating position is suspiciously high. It's almost as if... no, it can't be! Has Honda really designed the world's first sports hatch for the Saga set?

It's a classic: Humber

In the old days, old folk knew where they were in the car market. Whereas now every new car seems targeted at a mythical, mid-twenties rollerblading, rock-climbing loft dweller, until about 1975, car makers only appeared interested in the over fifties.

Back then, the market was awash with big, soft, comfortable, conservative, high-riding cars with large boots, prominent wireless controls, nice-sized parcel shelves on which to display elaborate tissue-box holders, and ample glove boxes for storing tins of boiled sweets and string-backed gloves. These were cars made by Alvis, Humber, Armstrong Siddeley, Austin, Wolseley, Hillman and Daimler. Proud names all, and their cars undoubtedly made the world a better-mannered, more genteel kind of place, but one can't help notice that none of them has survived.

These days, of course, we are all living to riper ages and the fastest growing sector of the population is the over-sixties. Might Honda be playing a smarter long game than we give them credit for?

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