Mike Rutherford: Thanks a million So what qualifies as a "wrong" car? Common sense says anything with a high official price, an inappropriately small discount, high insurance, high fuel consumption, poor reliability, indifferent dealer network and, most damaging of all, a tendency to plummet in value rapidly. If a car doesn't retain at least 40 per cent of its official list price after three years/36,000 miles from new, it's the wrong car. Keep this simple rule in mind and the money you'll save should cover the cost of your annual summer holiday. The biggest car-related disappointment in all my years at the Telegraph has been the obscenely overpriced all-electric car. Starting next week, I'm campaigning to get consumer legislation introduced to ensure that the published range of such cars is real-world accurate. In terms of sheer uselessness, nobody came close to Transport Secretary John Prescott. Not that "Two Jags" was alone in screwing up the Transport portfolio during my Telegraph years. Glenda Jackson, Lord Macdonald, Stephen Byers, Alistair Darling, Justine Greening and Mike Penning have been almost as bad to - and for - the motorist. Be they insurers or their brokers, car insurance firms need to hang their corporate heads in shame for sending the price of policies through the roof. Oil companies have behaved almost as badly, too. On a more positive note, Bob Lutz (latterly of General Motors, formerly Chrysler) is the top "car bloke" on the planet. And equally convincing is his likely successor for that tag, Lord March, ringmaster of the greatest car-related shows on earth at Goodwood. Unquestionably, Skoda, Audi and Kia qualify as the most improved car firms of the era. All things considered, no car-producing nation on the planet impresses more than Germany, not because it has several prestige brands (after all, the UK has more) but because it manages to build upscale cars in large numbers (the UK doesn't) at not-unreasonable retail prices. Finally, the Skoda Citigo is the most cost-effective car and greatest bargain of the modern era. If anyone tells you otherwise, they're wrong. Enough said. It's time for me to move up.