19/06/2019
NEWS STORY
For as long as anyone can remember, F1's powers that be have insisted that one of the main ways to improve the competition in the sport would be by imposing a budget cap.
By limiting the amount that teams can spend it is believed that in addition to ending the all-out spending wars we have witnessed over the years, a cap on budgets would not only help level the playing field but encourage new teams to the sport.
The previous management sought to introduce a budget cap, and FIA president, Max Mosley certainly came close, but in the end it came to nothing and those new teams enticed to enter F1 with the promise of a spending ap soon learned to their cost that it was not to be.
Since buying the sport in early 2017, Liberty Media has made no secret of its desire to introduce a cap, seeing it as the cornerstone of its plan to level the playing field and thereby improve the racing by hopefully ending the monopoly of the bigger funded teams.
Though the final details of the budget cap, along with all the other various rules and regulations for 2021, have been delayed until October, F1 boss Chase Carey insists it is the way forward for the sport.
"It took us a year to discuss this process through," he tells Servus TV. "Not only to get a suitable limit but also a process with which we can review it accordingly.
"Everyone can be sure that the cost structure is reliable," he insists. "Our sport is complicated, but these tricks can be found in every business worldwide. The rules are clear and I am confident that this can also be checked properly and reliably."
As previously reported, though the budget cap will not be officially introduced until 2021, it is intended to give it a 'dry run' next year.
"The plan is to carry out a test run by 2020," admits Carey. "That won't affect the budget limit yet, but the process of how we check information. Everyone should get a year to understand how it works. We want to see what the results are like.
"It will be a learning process, I am sure," he adds. "We have no illusions.
"My guess is that we will refine the cost structure even further and we and the teams have to live with it. But we needed a starting point now and that is the beginning of a process that continues.
"We are trying to create a sport that makes the competition better than it is today. It must be a healthier business for everyone involved."
Despite Carey's confidence, there remains much scepticism, not only in terms of how it can be successfully policed, but various other factors which could still enter the equation.
For example, if the new regulations are revealed and the teams get to work only for Ferrari to exercise its power of veto, would this be included in the proposed £175m cap.
Were Haas to drop Dallara and bring its chassis design in-house or a team were to suffer a natural disaster such as a factory fire, how would this affect their caps?
Like the never-ending range of 'what ifs' being raised in terms of Brexit, one can understand why the 2021 regulations package has been delayed.