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Nissan LEAF: Fleet sales double

Nissan has revealed that fleet sales of its electric LEAF have doubled in the UK, with overall Nissan fleet sales up 9 per cent. Sales of electric cars are not exactly stellar, but there is a light at the end of a very long tunnel shining dimly on UK EV sales – the fleet sector. Nissan has reported that its fleet sales in the UK – with 89 per cent of all fleets sales of cars actually built in the UK – has risen by 9 per cent so far in 2012, but the Nissan LEAF EV has seen its fleets sales more than double.

MG CS SUV Concept heading for Shanghai Motor Show

MG are still struggling to make much of an impact on the car landscape, but one car that could change that is a funky urban crossover / SUV to give cars like the Nissan Juke a run for their money. That looked to be on the cards last year when MG turned up at the Beijing Motor Show with the MG Icon, an SUV.Crossover Concept that took the ‘Ugly but Cute’ style cues from the Juke but grafted on a nose that looked like it could have come from MG’s sports car past. The Icon was a decent effort – and even won an award for ‘Best Concept’ at Beijing from Autoweek – but it looks like MG has decided the design of the Icon was just a bit too radical, so they’ve toned it down with a new concept heading for this year’s Shanghai Motor Show – the MG CS Concept.

Vauxhall Adam (& Opel Adam): GM’s new ‘MINI’ in Europe

It's the Vauxhall Adam - name after Adam Opel GM’s MINI rivalling new small car for Europe will be the Vauxhall Adam, an odd name to celebrate the founder of Opel. It’s been known as the Opel ‘Junior’ (and, of course, Vauxhall ‘Junior’ for the UK) as it’s been blatting round roads camouflaged with swirly paint and bolt-on panels. But now it has a name, and the name is Adam (we also got the Adam ‘writing’ out its own name on the roads of Frankfurt in a rather odd introduction to the new ‘Mini’ car – video below).