Thanks for the replies. First off I made a mistake in my post. I have a spare battery that I keep charged in the garage and I tried to jump it first with that and because I got the leads wrong it melted the jump leads. I bought another set and got it started from our little peugeot 107 would you believe! It was then that the vsc light came on. I wasn't sure if I'd killed the battery but luckily after a day and a bit it's recharged and seems to be ok but the same problem exists. I've just got back from unsuccessfully trying to get an obd2 reader locally so will look on ebay as was suggested. I just wondered if my RAC cover would help, I tend to forget I have it as I've never had to use it before. Anyway I'll post back on here with any further developments. There are so many obd2 readers on ebay and varying prices. Can anyone recommend a particular one for these cars?