Over the Easter holidays my family and me boarded a plane to Ireland before the Iceland volcano erupted. It was an annual family gathering and as I have not been there for one before I thought it was about time I showed my face.

My dad had organised a rent-a-car for the family and to my disappointment heard the dreadful news that it was a Ford Focus Diesel. It’s not the Focus part that turned my stomach, it was the six-letter word diesel. My family all own diesel cars, including the worst one of them all. The Rover 220. It’s loud, slow and a horrible green colour. Therefore its nickname is The Tank. The diesels sit on the driveway thanks to the father, who is one of these crazy select few who seem to think that diesels are better than petrols.

As we landed in Ireland we headed over to the rent-a-car desk only to be told we wouldn’t be getting a Focus. It was April 1^st and didn’t know whether it was an April Fools prank but instead we were given a Vauxhall Insignia Petrol. Petrol! This put a big grin on my face and a frown on my dads’. We would be driving around Ireland without the loud grunt coming from the exhaust. It would also be a first that when the engine started it wouldn’t wake the whole neighbourhood.

The Insignia is very easy on the eye and I have been a fan since their release last year. They have a sporty look to them but also have family in mind. The boot space was generous as we squeezed in our suitcases, but as it went back far it wasn’t deep enough. But as we only had the car for a week and didn’t intend on using the car much it was ok for us.

It was then time to set off on our journey and as I took a seat at the back I felt very enclosed within the car. The seat wrapped itself around me and left me feeling very comfortable. The only complaints I have to make about the rear seating is the slanted roof that limits head room. I was constantly hitting my head on the slant and if I were any bigger it would be a big pain in the backside. The other problem was the high doors. The whole frame was high up restricting my view out of the window and the theme ran throughout the whole of car.

As we tootled down the motorway the ride was mediocre. The car’s suspension would find every dip and bump in the road surface and certainly let you know when it found one.

It was when we got onto the country roads that would really test the car. As we went round every twist and turn the car didn’t seem to be as smooth as first thought. I didn’t know whether it was my dads’ driving as he is used to a diesel engine with a lot of torque or petrol was beginning to let me down. He still kept the same pattern of being lazy with the gears and changing at low revs. I was hoping that 40 minutes into the journey he would have seen the light and converted to petrol. But I was wrong.

When going up hills the car seemed to develop a huge amount of lag. The father dropped gears bringing up the revs but still the car refused to respond. I was beginning to think my dad was right but I didn’t want to agree with one of these diesel fanatics.

The following day I asked if I could drive the car back from the shops. To my amazement I was given the keys. This has never happened before. I felt like a child in a sweet store as I unlocked the car.

I inserted the keys and started the engine. I looked down to release the handbrake but only to realise there wasn’t one. With a puzzled face I queried my dad as to how you take it off. A simple Park button was in its place instead. This was the first I had seen one of these contraptions on a standard family car.

After playing around knowing what dial does which, we were off. The first thing I noticed was the gearbox. It was very clunky and wasn’t much movement with the stick. This meant it was hard to find the correct gear and took a few changes to come to grips with it.

We left the town centre and headed up hill and I began to realise my dad was making sense, much to my disappointment. The car was very slow and the rev needle didn’t want to go past 3,00rpm no matter how hard you had your foot on the accelerator. I tried everything to push the 1.8 litre engine up the hill but it was one fight I wasn’t going to win.

I wasn’t going to win the battle with the clutch either. When leaving junctions I tried releasing it slowly, quickly, finding the bite but nothing worked. After a long journey you would develop a bad case of clutch foot. It was very heavy, usually I like a heavy clutch as I can find the bite and roll on it but with the Insignia it was like finding a needle in a haystack.

The poor visibility from the back seats again ran all the way through to the front. The high dashboard and slanted sweeping roof made it difficult to see out of.

Vauxhall’s bid to enter the Insignia into a market already dominated by the likes of Honda, Toyota and Ford has not got off to the best of starts. There are multiple problems with the car and I wish I had enough time to let you know of them all.

The best parts of the car are its looks inside and out. The sweeping body makes the car very elegant and straight away pulls you in, but you must resist. It must be why so many of them were littered over Ireland’s roads. The men who walked into a Vauxhall dealership and left with an Insignia have shot themselves in the foot with a great big rocket launcher. Their wives have probably left them and taken the children, they’ve lost their job and nobody wants to be seen with him out in public. Vauxhall should rename it the Medusa or Marriage Wrecker.

After a week of owning the car it was about time to hand back the keys with much delight to my father. For the first time in a very long while I was given the opportunity to show him how petrols are better than diesels and I was let down. Back to the drawing board for me.

The steep £18,000 Vauxhall are asking for the basic model is still in dire need of improvements. For the very top of the range you will be requiring a deep wallet to cover the £30,000 asking price. For that amount of money you get a 2.8 litre V6 turbo fitted with a VXR badge.

The car got us from A to B, but with a struggle. If you are looking to buy this car I would look elsewhere as this car should remain a rent-a-car.