Ok, cue the Elgar, and with the sound of Land of Hope and Glory ringing in my ears, I shall now proudly declare to the world that I'm a proud British subject, and that I absolutely adore the new Mini Clubman.

Never mind the fact that the Mini brand is now owned by BMW, a German company, or the fact that I'm actually a dual Canadian/British citizen nowadays. None of that matters to me, because if I want to wave my automotive team flag, I don't really have much choice.

You see, we may build a ton of American and Japanese cars here in Canada, but do we really consider them Canadian vehicles? I don't think so, not in the real sense of the word!

So until such time as some new Canadian car manufacturer emerges and finally produces the "Saskatchewan Screamer", I'm going to don my Union Jack boxer shorts and sing the praises of the British motor car industry, or at least, what's left of it!

Which brings us nicely to this week's test vehicle, the new Mini Clubman?

This vehicle makes so much sense to me. After all, I was brought up in the days of the original Mini, when they produced so many model variations, that it was difficult to count them all.

There was the original little Mini, the Mini Cooper and Cooper S. Then came the Mini Traveler (the Woody Wagon), the Mini Van (not to be confused with the people carrier of later fame), and there was even a Mini Pickup truck.

That was the practicality of a front transverse-mounted engine in a small front wheel drive vehicle. Something, that over the years, many other manufacturers came to realize.

So now we have the launch of the new Clubman, although, in many ways, I think that it should have been called the Traveler after the original Mini station wagon. BMW took a little poetic license with that and named it after the old Clubman model which was, in fact, a disastrous attempt by British Leyland to update the original Mini by fitting an ugly square shaped front end to it. Not a popular decision to say the least, and was therefore soon dropped from the range.

Of course, you've all probably read numerous articles and reviews on the new Mini, mine included (at least I hope so), and so it seems a tad obsolete to retell the entire story. Therefore, all I'm going to do, is relate the differences that the Clubman body makes.

For a start, the most obvious, is the added room which you gain. Now we're not talking super stretch here, but those extra few inches (approximately 9 1/2) do actually make a difference!

You can now carry someone slightly larger than a Tasmanian devil in the back seat. In fact, I'm over 6 ft and I fit quite reasonably in the back of the Clubman, and there's still enough room for another 6 footer up front.

This added length to the body comes in part from the extra wheelbase, which seems to make the Mini even more enjoyable on the highway, as it smoothes out the bumps much better than the standard Mini.

Then, of course, we have the luggage area. Mini's, over the years, became famous for their small exterior size, and yet rather spacious interior. In fact, several have tried to enter the Guinness Book of Records by attempting to jam piles of people into them. Mini Canada has just succeeded in getting 20 five year old kids into the new Mini Clubman (However, there was no mention of whether they managed to pry them all out again!).