Car Review: Vauxhall Insignia GSi: A machine honed to the needs of its target user

An unusually handsome creation, the Insignia Tourer could pass for a Mercedes-Benz... until you discover its sombre interior

(Pictures by Vauxhall)

Let’s face it: if, after all these years, Vauxhall can’t make a car focused on its driver (by which I mean what we used to call a commercial traveller, or rep) then they really ought to just give up, go home and tune in to Love Island instead.

They can, of course, and I have rarely met a machine that is so honed to the needs of its target user as the Vauxhall Insignia Sports Tourer. The boot, for example, as well as being impressively long and with easy-flip folding rear seats, features rails with adjustable sliding hubs on them so you can strap loads in with infinite flexibility.

The seats are superbly comfortable with excellent adjustable lumbar support. The settings for the heated seats are well judged too – lots of cars miss a “goldilocks”, just right, level of warmth. I know #firstworldproblems, but I’m just saying – and you are shelling out £30,000-plus, after all. The sat nav “knows” how British postcodes work so you don’t get frustrated, or lost.

(Vauxhall)

The head-up display is easily moved around by a button on the dash, rather than having to try and rummage around in some menu. The radio works. These are the sorts of touches that have been picked up by decades of listening to drivers. In that respect the Insignia mirrors the Ford Transit van, another machine built to do a job, and evolved to do it exceptionally well.

With an Insignia you should also expect the kind of low running costs that fleet managers like to see; the flip side for private buyers being that you might not enjoy the same kind of discount on a new model that those buying a few hundred at a time are offered. The only thing I really missed was a fully adaptive cruise control, the one where it brakes and accelerates as you tail the vehicle ahead, even in traffic jams.

The Insignia, then, is a machine built for work, rather in the way that the architect Le Corbusier used to think of his houses and flats as “machines for living” rather than dwellings. (If that’s not too pretentious). It works.

(Vauxhall)

That’s all very well, and all very well established, as this iteration of the Insignia has been around since last year. Now, though, we are being treated to a little variation on the theme – the GSi version, reviving a Vauxhall performance sub-brand that quietly faded away for a while. This is designed to shows that Vauxhall can build a vehicle that is a “driver’s car” in the actually-good-to-drive sense, too.

There’s a new eight-speed automatic gearbox, for starters, which is smooth and allied, for my test car, to a diesel engine that was quieter than I’ve come to expect. It’s got two turbo chargers, which mean it performs pretty well – with fine urge at typical motorway speeds. There’s also a petrol option.

PSA Group bought the Vauxhall brand last year as part of its acquisition of General Motors' loss-making European arm (Vauxhall)

The power is transmitted through all four wheels, Audi-style, with a twin-clutch differential, which is as sophisticated as it sounds, and the car’s stance is low and sporty, the better for handling. It feels sure-footed and responsive, either in switchable “Tourer” or “sport” personalities. In truth, the Insignia is a bit too bulky to feel like you’d want to throw it around – it is a diesel estate when all’s said and done; the real benefit comes in a certain assuredness on the road, a feeling of safe and predictable behaviour.

Now, you might think that the Insignia Tourer would be a ubiquitous sort of sight, just as its much-loved predecessor Vectra, Cavalier and Viva estates were in their day, but such is the frenzy for “premium” brands and SUVs that it’s actually becoming a bit of a niche player. What was once mainstream – the family saloon/estate – has become a more unusual choice. So the one time I saw another Insignia, at the dismal foot of the M1 near Brent Cross, I was almost startled. The Insignia Tourer is an unusually handsome creation, with the contrasting bright silver styling line stretching down to the rear light cluster. It could pass for a Mercedes-Benz, externally at any rate, with just the right blend of tradition and avant garde.

(Vauxhall)

Not so much indoors, through an extremely conventional interior design, to the point of boredom. Very sombre it is, and, I discovered on visiting the Vauxhall website to try out some lighter shades of trim, gloomy black is compulsory. The screen graphics are business-like, and while it would be absurd to criticise the typeface, this is one of the things that can make a difference to perceived quality. Volvo, for example, make a point of echoing the iPad in theirs, and other makes replicate the house style in the interior. It probably doesn’t cost anything, and shows attention to detail, a premium touch.

The spec

Vauxhall Insignia Sports Tourer GSi  
Price: £33,965 (£36,180 as tested)
Engine capacity: 2.0 litre diesel 4cyl, 8-sp auto, AWD
Power output (PS @ rpm): 210 @ 4,000
Top speed (mph): 145
0-60mph (seconds): 7.4
Fuel economy (mpg): 40.4
CO2 emissions (g/km):  187

I suppose it’s a bit too tedious and predicable to say that if you can see the past the badge, the Vauxhall is fine car on a par with its premium competition. Maybe it’s just as well, then, that it’s not quite true, and so the cliché remains in its box, so to speak. I had been hoping to be pleasantly surprised, but in all in honesty I wasn’t, in one crucial respect. The interior, which is of good quality and well put together at the Opel plant at Russelsheim, Germany (if you want a British Vauxhall you need to ask for an Astra), just isn’t on a par with the premium brands.

The Vauxhall will also face a stiff challenge, not only from the likes of the BMW 3-series but also the new Peugeot 508 saloon and estate being released later in the year. Peugeot is a brand that seems – it’s early days yet – to have rediscovered the importance of quality in construction and materials and flair in design. Seeing as Peugeot now own Vauxhall (PSA bought it and Opel from GM), we may well see some more commonality between mainstream Peugeot and Vauxhall/Opel products, such as the next generation of Insignia/508-based cars.

That will mean a little less choice in the market place, which is a pity, but it might mean that Vauxhall, Opel, Peugeot, DS and Citroen brands, now all in the same gang, benefit from each other’s expertise in different areas. Just so long as they keep making some Vauxhall cars in Britain, all will be well.