Personally, I would never recommend buying a Renault. I am a former Renault buyer and they are the “fils de putes” of unreliability. If a Renault turbo doesn’t go first then it will always be a gearbox fault. Renault’s are the va te faire foutre of cars in that they often va te faire foutre after a while. When the turbo of my pre-owned Megane blew after less than a year of careful ownership I rolled up my sleeves to replace the deceased part.

What I found was a car with cost-cutting measures written into every component. And I mean every component, even the screws and fasteners were poorly manufactured. As I replaced the Megane’s turbo I quickly sold the car on and have never ever considered buying another Renault.

It turns out Carlos “the fugitive fraudster” Ghosn was the mastermind behind this cost-cutting initiative. Great for Ghosn’s personal balance sheet, not so great as an ownership proposition. Under Ghosn, the Renault Nissan grew from strength to strength until he was arrested in Japan on November 18, 2018 for financial misconduct.

Renault and Nissan were the global leader in car sales for 2019 with 10.76 million vehicles sold. The arrest of Ghosn has exposed fractures within the alliance. But that hasn’t stopped Renault from continuing Ghosn’s legacy, which was built primarily to serve Ghosn’s personal expenditure account and self-aggrandisement.

And here is the Ghosn legacy. The about bloody time Renault Clio and Captur Plug-in Hybrid range. Both vehicles are based around a 1.6-litre petrol engine and an F1 inspired clutchless gearbox. Both can travel up to 38mph on electric power alone and both have an electric range of 30 miles.

The latter is a lie, often based on extrapolated lab data. The marketing and PR take this data and extract further extrapolations to arrive at an estimated electric range. In layman’s term, the marketing and PR simply lie to make the car more saleable for the purposes of personal promotion within this dying alliance. That’s how life works folks.

The about bloody time Renault Clio and Captur Plug-in Hybrids will be available to order in the UK soon, pricing is yet to be revealed. Both about bloody time Clio and Captur Plug-in Hybrids will form Renault’s major foray into total product electrification… about fucking time.