Lovely cars, but I tried a manual Edition 35 (235bhp) a few weeks back. It was on 17" winter tyres and it was cold and damp in Wales and it was a horrendous understeery pig of a car. We had to check the XDS pseudo slippy diff that brakes the front wheels was fitted. It was, but didn't help. Nice interior though, light years ahead of the 1. Oh, and we managed 24mpg over the day. I imagine proper tyres would help!
To be honest if I had to drive one car every day, I'd probably buy a GTI, but I'll stick to my 1 for my driving jollies!