Those numbers kinda sucks, TDI gets only 6.9L/100km 
I usually average around 7.5L/100km between Thunder Bay and Waterloo with my 10 yr old, grossly overloaded matrix, and I don't hypermill either.
I guess the FE has not really improved over the past decade, it's just marketing.
For North American diesels, that is true - increased emissions regulations choke the exhaust so they aren't as efficient as the dirty smokers you could get 10 years ago... however, on the combustion end with turbocharging, higher compression, direct injection and other tech, they are more efficient, which they need to be in order to not increase fuel consumption too much and lose the marketing campaign points...
And there's really no point comparing any of your consumption numbers in different cars to Justin's numbers in these cars - Driving style can have a huge effect on consumption, and Justin is showing some worst-case scenario numbers for real-world driving, but on a level playing field against other cars he's driven, these have done the best.
Curiously, I got the same 6.9 L/100 km over the course of three months in a Golf Wagon TDI in mostly
city driving, so that tells me Justin is a really aggressive driver, not that the TDI is inefficient...
I'm also surprised the iQ made his list - I have been quite disappointed in the iQ's consumption in the times we've had it, but the smaller, 2-seat smart isn't much better, so there is that...
