Not every car that goes on sale in Australia is good, but which are the worst that should have been stopped by customs?

Drive's main cover story this week focused on the 10 vehicles we'd like to see imported to Australia, but there are also plenty of cars that shouldn't have come in the first place.

Here's my top five list of cars that should have been deported, but which cars would be on your list?

Jez Spinks

Holden Piazza
Isuzu is best known for building trucks and utes. For good reason. In the mid-’80s this rebadged Japanese sports car promised much with its wedge-shaped body and turbocharged 2.0-litre engine, but it was relatively expensive and its handling led some testers at the time to regard it as one of the scariest cars they’d ever driven.

Chrysler PT Cruiser
It looked like a lost prop from child-gangster musical Bugsy Malone, and only visual quirkiness can best explain the appeal as several thousand Australians splurged money on America’s tilt at retro cars. Sure, the Cruiser was cleverly packaged to provide flexible space for either passengers or lifestyle cargo, but compared to similarly priced cars it was also a retrograde step in terms of refinement, engine performance and driving ability.

Ford Taurus
If trying to sell America’s famous large car alongside Australia’s popular large cars was a toe-in-the-water exercise, few were surprised when the Taurus drowned in 1998 after just two years. There was little wrong with the sedan’s smooth V6, though in contrast to local buyer preference it sent power to the front wheels rather than the rears. Perhaps the biggest showroom killer, however, was a droopy design that suggested it had been beaten with the same ugly stick as the much-maligned AU Falcon that overlapped it.

Hummer H3
General Motors’ military-inspired 4WD predictably attracted an army of buyers when it first hit our shores in 2007 with machismo bodywork and off-roading credentials. Equally inevitable, however, is that sales tanked as soon as the novelty factor had worn off – or perhaps as soon as buyers realised the H3 was quite dreadful to drive on the road.

Proton Waja
Car makers should never underestimate the importance of a good nameplate (as Nissan can attest after switching from Pulsar to Tiida for its small car), and Malaysian company Proton’s 2001 Waja also bemused Australian punters. As did its relatively high pricing, though discounting came into effect just a year later in response to lacklustre sales. Waja is Malaysian for ‘steely warrior’, but although the car was indeed made of metal there was nothing robust either about the car’s ageing four-cylinder engine (76kW) or its iffy build quality.