THE NORTH-EAST has good reason to be thankful for the Qashqai. Without it Nissan's manufacturing plant in Sunderland wouldn't have weathered the financial storm as well as it has to date.

Berthed in Britain out of a determination to do better after the relative failure of the Almera, the Qashaqi is a new kind of crossover, one that offers the best bits of an off-roader without the crippling running costs or unwieldy size.

Ditching plans for a conventional hatchback to replace the Almera was a gamble, but the public willingly bought into Nissan's vision of what the Qashqai had to offer. In fact, it's become the company's biggest medium-sized hit since the Sunny.

As well as holding down a regular place in the UK's Top Ten most popular cars, the Qashqai is one of the biggest selling imported vehicles in Russia and a best seller as far afield as Australia and New Zealand. That's a great result for a car that neatly side-stepped the traditional Focus-Astra-Golf bun fight by offering something entirely new.

That's great news for Sunderland, which is the Qashqai's worldwide production hub, and the regional economy as a whole.

When it launched a couple of years ago the Nissan was in a class of one. Now, though, Qashqai is facing a new test of its abilities. Other manufacturers have been quick to spot the car's success and rushed similar SUV-lites into production.

Only last month Skoda launched the Yeti into the UK marketplace to widespread approval, and others are coming.  Of course, Nissan knew it wouldn't have the marketplace to itself for long and has already moved to extend the Qashqai's appeal - quite literally.

The Qashqai + 2 adds to the existing car's practicality with a third row of fold down seats in the boot.

Most of the time they lay flat to the floor, giving unimpeded access to the roomy boot, but when you need them they flip out  to provide a couple of small seats for young passengers. It's the perfect arrangement when the Qashqai is called upon to ferry your kids and their friends around town.

To accommodate the extra seats the car had to be lengthened (it's about 136mm longer than a five-seat Qashqai) but in other respects it's the same.

That means you sit in a nicely finished cabin (Nissan's designers were given a larger budget than usual so they could create an interior that felt more upmarket than the old Almera), that's both durable and practical. Your eye-line is higher than the view out of a standard hatchback, but lower than a pukka 4x4, enhancing the Qashqai's feeling of solidity and security.

Nissan says it wanted a "sporty driver" feel to the cockpit which is why your hands grip a thick rimmed stitched steering wheel and you gaze on conventional instruments surrounded by alloy inserts. The chunky stalks operate with the kind of well-oiled precision you'd expect of a rough/tough SUV designed for a hard life and, as you'd expect of a Japanese car, the ergonomics are spot-on.

A word, too, about the climate control.

The Qashqai was subjected to a gruelling serious of climatic conditions during its development, from a frozen Finnish lake to the searing heat of the Andorra hills, to ensure its air conditioning could cope with a huge range of temperatures.

The air vents are simplicity itself - you just poke and twist them to direct a cooling breeze to your face - but careful airflow shaping has ensured the airstream doesn't "cling" to the dashboard. A vent in the dash top sends air above the front seat passengers heads and into the rears. It's cheaper than running vents directly into the back of the cabin but no less effective. Passengers reported they could feel a comforting stream of fresh air.

There's plenty of room in the main cabin and the sporty seats are comfortable. Nissan had to order a last minute re-design of the second row seats when prototype tests revealed a lack of support. The alterations cost more than £200,000 but no one in the back of the test car reported a lack of under thigh support or numb bum syndrome.

Although it undeniably looks like an SUV Nissan's stylists penned subtle changes to differentiate the Qashqai from traditional 4x4s. The upper third of the body is more curvaceous and less boxy than, say, the X-Trail and the rugged lower body, particularly the ratio of plastic cladding to bare metal, has been carefully balanced with the top half.

If I have a concern, it's that the 1.5-litre Renault diesel engine isn't really man enough for the job of lugging around a fully loaded Qashqai + 2.

In normal day-to-day tooling around it's fine - if rather noisy - but I could feel the different when I loaded up with six passengers. It felt as though someone had thrown a ship's anchor out the rear window!

Granted, the 1.5 is impressively frugal but I'd be tempted to trade a few mpg for the better power and torque of the larger 2.0-litre turbodiesel if this were my car.

The handling is a mix of hatchback and SUV. Body control is good for a tall vehicle and there's decent levels of grip, but the ride is notchy around town when the suspension tends to trample over small bumps instead of soaking them up. It's not a problem if that's how you like your cars.

It's easy to see why the Qashqai is so popular. Assertive without being aggressive, practical and easy to live with it makes a fine family car. The extra row of seats are a neat addition and make the +2 variant a genuine alternative to a mid-sized MPV like the Citroen Picasso.

No wonder Nissan is hard at work on a smaller car that borrows some of the Qashqai's ideas. Let's hope that, too, will be built in the North-East.

    SPEC: Engine: 1.5-litre turbodiesel Max power: 105 bhp Max torque: 177 lb/ft Max speed: 108 mph 0-60 mph: 12.2 seconds Av fuel cons: 52.3 mpg CO2 emissions: 145 g/km   Equipment: Electric windows, mirrors, alloy wheels, seven seats, power steering, ABS. Optional extras included on the test car: panoramic glass sunroof, touch screen satellite navigation.