Japanese cars are tops for reliability, according to a major survey by the Consumers' Association. They occupied four of the five top spots in a reliability league table compiled by the association's Which? magazine.

At the bottom was the Land Rover Discovery, with 19 per cent of these models breaking down in the last year.

The Which? table dealt with cars up to two years old and showed the number of breakdowns each had had in the previous 12 months.

Overall, seven per cent of the 81 models in the survey suffered a breakdown - one per cent worse than a similar table compiled a year ago.

The Swedish Saab 9-3 was top of the table with the four Japanese models - the Lexus IS200, Mazda 626, Mazda MX-5 and the new Nissan Almera. All recorded no breakdowns in the previous year.

Conversely, the Skoda Felicia, which did well in last year's survey, slipped down the table, with eight per cent of the models breaking down.