The hot hatchback is dead! Now where have I heard that before? The suggestion has popped up every so often over the last half century or so for various reasons – young people can’t insure them, they’re too easily nicked and so on – but somehow they have always endured.
But they seem to be dying out all over again. This once ubiquitous breed is now rapidly becoming the White Rhino of the automotive ecosphere, along with others persecuted to near extinction like V10 engines, hydraulic power-assisted steering, clutch pedals and ignition keys.
There are of course some left and others with electric powertrains have arrived, but even those that have survived now come with a trait so undesirable it alone might accelerate their dwindling numbers: they have become phenomenally expensive. Take the Toyota GR Yaris as an example: when introduced five years ago it cost just £29,995. Today? Try £46,045. A Mercedes-AMG A45 S cost almost exactly £50,000 in 2020. Today it’s over £65,000. And that’s going to die within the next year too. When I called Mercedes-Benz UK to ask for one to take part in this test, there was none not only on the press fleet but in the entire business. And there are no plans to replace it. Of course all the hot Ford hatchbacks died a while back and while I’d not heard that the Honda Civic Type R had officially passed over to the other side, on Honda’s UK website it is notable only for its absence. So I expect that’s gone too.
