25/09/2007
NEWS STORY
Just over a week after fining McLaren $100m for its role in the spy saga - one of the biggest fines in the history of sport - FIA President Max Mosley has criticised F1 teams for continuing to spend excessively, warning that the issue needs to be addressed.
Mosley is critical of the teams for arguing for a bigger slice of the sport's revenue whilst at the same time spending more and more in pursuit of that extra fraction of a second.
In a letter leaked to sections of the media, including The Guardian, Mosley claims that "formula one's vast profits are currently being wasted on pointless exercises for the private entertainment of the teams' engineers. As a result, several independent teams are losing money when they should be making a profit, while car manufacturers are forced to spend excessively. This is the problem which needs to be addressed.
"If it did not waste money on pointless, hidden and duplicated technology, formula one would be an immensely profitable business," Mosley continues. "Each (team) would be a valuable franchise. Instead it is living on subsidies from the car industry and hand-outs from friendly billionaires."
The "friendly billionaires" clearly refers to Vijay Mallya, who, along with Michiel Mol, recently made an 80m euro bid for the Spyker team, which was last year bought from Russian billionaire Alex Shnaider. Mosley is also probably having a little dig at Mansour Ojjeh, who still owns 15% of McLaren.
Fact is, it is the teams' and the car manufacturers' money to spend as they wish. Furthermore it is the teams that provide 'the show', even though they use a stage provided - at considerable profit - by Bernie Ecclestone. The top ten teams in the Constructors' Championship share 50% of the commercial rights purse.
Clearly feeling that the teams have no right to demand a greater slice of the F1 'cake', Mosley added: "Until the basic problem of costs has been resolved, time should not be wasted discussing how the money is to be distributed."