'Why choose a Vauxhall? What even is a Vauxhall?'

What do you do if you’re Vauxhall?

The things we worried about a few years ago it being in the squeezed middle, neither a premium brand nor a value brand, which are the main places profitable car makers tend to be are coming to pass. Vauxhall has the second-most dealers in this country, is still the third-most-trusted brand in some surveys and yet is currently being outsold here by Peugeot.

Worse still, that already perilous position of not having an obvious identity, of not being able to give a clear reason to buy one of its cars (buy a BMW because you’re posh; buy a Skoda because you’re sensible), has since been worsened by Chinese car makers arriving with prices that Vauxhall just can’t match (it’s not alone).

And if you don’t give a monkey’s about what badge your car wears or where it comes from, why would you look beyond those Chinese cars? Even if they are using the Uber business model: arrive and undercut until they dominate the establishment out of business.

Vauxhall is surely one of the makers that BYD, Chery, Geely, MG etc would most like to see off and think they’re most likely to.

So why choose a Vauxhall today? What even is a Vauxhall, this famous old British brand? Put it this way, if you will forgive me talking shop: on international press events, British journalists tend to arrive first or last, because the organisers have to change the Opel badges before we get there. Vauxhalls’ dynamics aren’t even signed off in the UK any more, as they were until quite recently.

Into this, then, enter a new performance sub-brand, or a revival of an old one: GSE.

Are long-lost fun cars like the Saxo VTS about to return?

“OMG! GSE” they like to say. More like “WTF? GSE”, because they’ve launched it on a Mokka, a car not known for being bought by drivers who put dynamism at the top of their wish lists. If retirees pop into their Vauxhall showroom and sign up for a Mokka GSE, thinking it’s a trim level like on the Astra, they’re in for quite the surprise.

I like this car’s jib a lot. As I write, outside my window is Jarama race track, and I’m hoping to finish this copy in time to have another go. In an electric Vauxhall. A Mokka. On a race track. Barmy.

I think it’s a great-handling car, but that’s not enough on its own to transform a brand or to make it interesting to the average punter. Back in the day, if you bought a Citroën AX or Saxo, it looked cool and they gave you free insurance. That sucked twenty-somethings into Citroën ownership, and some of them stayed. Certainly they liked it. And it zhuzhed things up a bit.

Today, if you buy an electric Vauxhall, they give you 50,000 Tesco Clubcard points. That isn’t exactly a sexy sell, is it?

Plans, though, are afoot. Vauxhall has a new managing director, Steve Catlin, and he isn’t blind to the brand’s issues. Next year we will see it try to rebuild more of an identity for itself, which I dearly think and hope will include a Corsa GSE. Ideally in bold colours, with some decent styling options, at a good price and maybe an incentive that involves more than a discount on your fish fingers. A Saxo VTR for the ages.

Because I think there is, just about, a gap in the market. We’ve spent the past 25 years thinking and saying that you should buy a Ford because it’s built by people who care about driving, but there’s no compelling evidence that’s still the case. Ford knows its European car range needs to be “more robust” (ie better), but I don’t know if that involves it being more fun to drive.

And in a world where everything is depressing, why not give us a little fun? Chinese cars are very cheap, but they are often quite crap to drive. You can buy one because it saves money. I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of feeling like I have to save money, like every decision I take should be austere. I want some joy, some fun, a spark. Give me a reason. Maybe a Vauxhall could do that.