Back in June, I wrote about China’s Jiangling Motors Corporation – the company who are still making Mk5 Ford Transits for their domestic market.

There are plenty of good reasons for this; these vans are robust, practical and simple to maintain.

The same cannot be said for all of the vans that have come out of British factories, however. Take the Austin Maestro van. In its day, a direct competitor to the Ford Escort van – but never as successful, and with a nasty habit of rusting away.

Despite this, it turns out that Masetro vans have been being built in China for some years. Chinese tobacco company Etsong started the trend, but soon sold out to automotive company FAW. They weren’t keen on making such an old design and stopped production, but a company called Chengdu YeMa have now taken up the reigns again and are now making a MPV version of the Maestro van.