When the announcement came through that TVR had been sold to a 12-year-old
Russian boy, there was a sense in the land that Britain’s motor industry was
no longer coughing up blood. It was dead.
But aren’t we forgetting something? Ooh, it’s on the tip of my tongue. I know
there’s something . . . Why yes, of course. Rover! The still intact tailfin
of the crashed airliner that is British Leyland.
Oh, it may been stripped of the Mini and Land Rover, and the rights to use
names such as Riley and Wolseley, which BMW now owns. But it still has
Longbridge. It still has thousands of employees. It is still a player.
But only by the skinny skin skin of its teeth. Sales are in freefall, with the
number of Rovers sold this year down by 19% and the number of MGs down by
6%.
The problem is that the line-up of cars on sale is now even older than the
people who buy them. The 45, for instance, was launched when Rameses III was
on the throne and the MGTF is still painted with woad. And while MG Rover
has so far spent £100m developing a new mid-range car, which looks rather
good, that’s only one-tenth of what’s really needed these days.
The company already had one tie-up with the Indians to produce the truly
ghastly and massively overpriced CityRover and now details are emerging of a
new co-production deal with the Chinese. There’s even some speculation that
the romantically handled Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC)
might buy Rover, though God knows why.
As SAIC already has tie-ups with Volkswagen and General Motors, this would be
a bit like Chelsea signing George Best. If the Chinese want British
engineering skills, they could simply employ some British engineers. And if
they want a base in the European Union, why buy Longbridge, which is in
Birmingham and has a main road running through the middle of it? Why not
simply build a brand new factory in, oh I don’t know, St Tropez?
Of course, I don’t own a short-sleeved shirt, or a set of golf clubs, or a
freemason’s robe, or a blue British Airways loyalty card, and this means I
don’t know anything about business. I’m here only to talk about the cars
Rover makes, which brings me to the driver’s door of its latest offering:
the MG Nutter Bastard Head-Butt Sister Shagger.
It’s a familiar looking door because it’s exactly the same as the one you’ll
find on a Rover 75. In fact, apart from a bit of tweakery here and a bit of
chicken wire there, it is pure 75 — a car named for the average age of the
people who buy it.
Inside, it’s much the same story. You have that familiar and enormous steering
wheel and a sense that you’ve somehow found yourself in a Harvester theme
pub. It’s all mock-Tudor this and half-timbered that.
At this point you will probably climb out again and buy an Audi instead. But I
urge you to persevere, because beneath the Radio 4 exterior beats a heavy
metal heart in the shape of a 4.6 litre Ford Mustang V8.
With two valves per cylinder, it’s far from the most sophisticated engine in
the world and nor is it the most powerful, nor the most economical. But
Rover’s engineers have had it in the shed, and I must say it sounds and
feels pretty good in a muted, throbby sort of way.
Think of it as the Merlin they used to put in P-51 fighters, an Anglo-American
joint effort that is in no way as sophisticated as the creamy-smooth jets
fitted to the German opposition, but a whole lot more charismatic and
loveable nonetheless.
And now we get to the really good bit, because instead of sending its power to
the front wheels, which would be a recipe for torque steer followed by some
hedge trimming, the oomph is fed down a prop shaft to the back wheels. So
there you are. Beneath the Frank Finlay exterior, you get what, in essence,
is V8 muscle car with rear-wheel drive.
Rear-wheel drive matters. It matters so much that BMW is using it as the sole
marketing thrust behind the new 1-series hatchback. The people at BMW know,
unless they’re blind and mad, that this new car is horrid to behold and as
practical as a curly ruler but that’s all okay because it’s rear-drive.
MG Rover has a similar philosophy. It didn’t bother changing the body, or the
seats or the steering wheel on the 75. It spent every penny it had — all
£4.50 of it — turning it into a rear-driver.
This is because in the far, extreme corners of the petrolhead’s domain, we all
know that no car can be really good unless drive goes to the back. It is a
given, the central pillar of all we hold dear. In a front-wheel-drive car,
the front wheels have to do the steering and provide the propulsion, and
this never quite works. Never. Even if you fit female front wheels that can
multitask, there’s always the sense that both the power and the steering are
being corrupted. It’s not pure. It’s not right.
In a rear-drive car, the jobs are split evenly around all four corners of the
car, and while this isn’t a guarantee of success, it is at least the right
sort of bedrock.
In the MG NBHBSS, it does work. Brilliantly. If you’re going really, really
fast, the whole machine assimilates you into its core and you become one.
The steering, unencumbered with power delivery, doesn’t send back any
muddled messages about what the front of the car is doing, so I had the
confidence to push harder. And the harder I pushed, the better it felt.
It’s not a razor-sharp handler. Think of it as a destroyer rather than a
speedboat, but in extremis, trust me on this, it’s very good.
Twice, in the last run of Top Gear, I took this car onto the track simply to
wake myself up, ready for the show. It got the adrenaline pumping and served
as a reminder about why I fell in love with cars in the first place.
So would I buy one? Well no, actually. Partly this is because there are many
faults, like there’s nowhere to put your left foot, and partly because it
could do with another 50 horsepower.
Also, I’d steer clear because I’d always have a nagging doubt about the future
of Rover itself. I’d worry that my expensive new toy would be stripped of
its warranty and service backup five minutes after I got it home.
Mostly, though, the reason why I’d steer well clear is that all those
imbeciles who used to wobble about the middle of the road in their enormous
Volvos have now got Rovers. Whenever I’m stuck in a huge tailback on the way
into Oxford, it’s always a 216 at the front, endlessly indicating right and
never actually doing so.
There’s a double mini roundabout in my local town and I can pretty much
guarantee that if I went down there now there’d be a 416 in the middle of
the junction, its driver glued solid by a wave of serotonin and fear. This
is not a club I wish to join.
I therefore have an idea for the bosses at Rover. Forget these half-arsed
tie-ups with engineering conglomerates in the emerging world. Make a pledge
to go it alone, to fight back, to repair the damage done over the years by
Red Robbo and the useless management and BMW. Adopt a Churchillian pose and
speak to the workforce about fighting them on the beaches.
And then start the new dawn by publicly banning anyone from buying a Rover if
they own a hat.
As I said earlier, I’m not a businessman and it might not be a sound business
plan. But you’ve tried everything else, for God’s sake.
VITAL STATISTICS
Model: MG ZT 260
Engine type: V8, 4601cc
Power: 260bhp @ 5000rpm
Torque: 302 lb ft @ 4000rpm
Transmission: Five-speed manual, rear-wheel drive
Acceleration: 0-60mph: 6.2sec
Top speed: 155mph
Fuel/CO2: 21.5mpg (comb) / 314g/km
Insurance: Group 19
Price: £28,495
Verdict: Confidence-inspiring, brilliantly involving,
and exciting to drive. But could you cope with being a Rover driver?
