20/10/2022
NEWS STORY
Numerous sources claim that the FIA has offered Red Bull an ‘Accepted Breach Agreement’ in a bid to settle budget cap breach row.
However, if such an agreement has been offered it is likely to provoke even more of a storm.
It is understood that the FIA made the offer to Red Bull days after the Japanese Grand Prix at which Max Verstappen secured his second title and following which the sport’s governing body finally revealed the results of its analysis of the teams’ financial submissions.
Under the terms of the agreement it is understood that Red Bull would have to accept whatever punishment the sport's governing body decides is appropriate, and without recourse to appeal, however, crucially it rules out such things as points deduction or a reduction of the team's budget cap in future seasons.
Quite how rival teams - or indeed fans - will view this remains to be seen, however, with the most likely punishment likely to be a fine, it would be widely seen as a soft option when one considers that when announcing the cap Ross Brawn had warned of dire consequences for those that exceeded it, including exclusion from the championship.
Red Bull is understood to be considering the offer of the agreement and is said to be issuing a statement on Friday, while Saturday sees team boss, Christian Horner at the official FIA press conference alongside Zak Brown, who earlier this week insisted that exceeding the cap is cheating.
Should the Austrian team reject the agreement, the matter would be put in the hands of the Cost Cap Adjudication Panel which would investigate the 'minor' breach which is understood to be around $2m.