The Volkswagen Golf has ended the Ford Fiesta’s long run as the UK’s best-selling car by marginally beating the Ford supermini by just over 200 units in June 2017 – while the new car market itself declined for a third consecutive month: it fell 4.8 percent compared to a year ago.
The Fiesta still managed to score second place in the new car registration charts though, despite currently being on runout: Ford is in the process of launching an all-new Fiesta, which Motoring Research has already driven.
The Ford Focus came in third place, leaving three cars closely matched at the top of the registrations chart, some way clear of the fourth-place Vauxhall Astra.
The Ford Fiesta is still the best-selling car in Britain year-to-date though, with a safety margin of over 19,000 cars ahead of the next-best Ford Focus…
June 2017 ‘stabilises’
Following a significant uplift in new car registrations in early 2017, monthly figures have fallen away sharply. This is because car buyers were bringing their delivery dates forward to dodge the controversial new VED car tax rules.
As the effect of this change fades, the market is starting to fall back in line with forecasts, while SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes says the first half of 2017 is still the second biggest on record.
“Provided consumer and business confidence holds, we expect demand to remain at a similarly high level over the coming months.”
The growth of alternative fuel vehicles continued: they commanded a 4.4 percent market share in June – up 29 percent on 2016. The decline of diesel continued as well, with registrations falling 14.7 percent. Diesel now takes just 42.5 percent of the overall sales mix, compared to 47.5 percent just one year ago.
10,721 alternatively-fuelled cars (models such as EVs and plug-in hybrids) were registered in June, up from 8311 a year ago. This compares to 103,564 diesel cars and 129,169 petrol cars.
Hawes called for more government aid to help the roll-out of more alternative fuel cars. It’s encouraging to see alternatively fuelled vehicles experiencing rapid growth,” he said, “but adoption is still at a relatively low level and more long term incentives are required if this new generation of vehicles is to be a more common sight on British roads.”
UK top 10 best-selling cars: June 2017
1: Volkswagen Golf (8808 cars)
2: Ford Fiesta (8601 cars)
3: Ford Focus (8283 cars)
4: Vauxhall Astra (6977 cars)
5: Mini (6630 cars)
6: Vauxhall Corsa (5739 cars)
7: Nissan Qashqai (5103 cars)
8: Volkswagen Polo (4705 cars)
9: BMW 3 Series (4264 cars)
10: Mercedes-Benz C-Class (4102 cars)
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