Dare I suggest a renault 5. I had a 1.1 campus as my first car. It made all of 45bhp when it was new! Yes they're pretty bad in a crash and pretty basic kit wise. Cheap to run and fix though. Having said that, I wrote mine off in a head on smash with a nissan bluebird and I survived.
I've also had a mk3 fiesta (my brother also had one as his first car) which was ok apart from the rot, which you really have to keep on top of. The tappets also needed frequent adjustment on my brothers one (sounded like a bag of spanners in a washing machine when they were out of adjustment).
106/saxo is a good shout. Even an AX would be ok, but they feel pretty flimsy compared to a 106. I had a 1.5D 106 which was pretty well bombproof reliability wise. It got hammered everywhere and still gave 50mpg+
My sister had an old curvy shape polo and she said that was ok, but thirsty as for some reason. She managed to write that off and she now has a 106 as well.
Others I can think of that might fit the bill: diahatsu charade, old shap clio, micra, suzuki swift (not sure if these will be in budget), smart car (again budget, but might be able to get an early one), cinqichento, scichento (how ever you spell them) etc
I've also had a mk3 fiesta (my brother also had one as his first car) which was ok apart from the rot, which you really have to keep on top of. The tappets also needed frequent adjustment on my brothers one (sounded like a bag of spanners in a washing machine when they were out of adjustment).
106/saxo is a good shout. Even an AX would be ok, but they feel pretty flimsy compared to a 106. I had a 1.5D 106 which was pretty well bombproof reliability wise. It got hammered everywhere and still gave 50mpg+
My sister had an old curvy shape polo and she said that was ok, but thirsty as for some reason. She managed to write that off and she now has a 106 as well.
Others I can think of that might fit the bill: diahatsu charade, old shap clio, micra, suzuki swift (not sure if these will be in budget), smart car (again budget, but might be able to get an early one), cinqichento, scichento (how ever you spell them) etc