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McLaren F1 boss Zak Brown has written a letter to the FIA slamming Red Bull for breaking the budget cap. The Mclaren boss expressed that the Milton Keyes-based team’s action "constitutes cheating". Brown wants penalties for Red Bull both financially and on the track and stated that any team who has overspent an unfair advantage both in the current and following year's car development.
Brown further added that FIA should take the required action and penalties immediately to maintain the integrity of the sport. The letter was reported by BBC Sport and is from 12 October. Brown addressed the letter to FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem and F1 president Stefano Domenicali.
The letter was also sent to the other teams who have not committed any cost-cap offences like Ferrari, Mercedes, Alpine, Alfa Romeo and Haas. The FIA announced last week that Red Bull was guilty of committing a "minor" breach of the cap. The offence was under the lesser of two categories under F1's financial regulations as well as a procedural breach.
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff and Ferrari’s team principal Mattia Binotto has also been putting pressure on the FIA to adequately punish Red Bull for overspending, but Zak Brown's letter emerges as the strongest stance on overspending. In the letter, Brown does not explicitly mention Red Bull, likely in an attempt to stress that such a response is necessary for any team that exceeds the budget cap.
Check the letter written by Zak Brown here:
"The overspend breach, and possibly the procedural breaches, constitute cheating by offering a significant advantage across technical, sporting and financial regulations. The FIA has run an extremely thorough, collaborative and open process. We have even been given a one-year dress rehearsal [2020], with ample opportunity to seek any clarification if details were unclear.
So, there is no reason for any team now to say they are surprised. The bottom line is any team who has overspend has gained an unfair advantage both in the current and following year's car development. We don't feel a financial penalty alone would be a suitable penalty for an overspend breach or a serious procedural breach. There clearly needs to be a sporting penalty in these instances, as determined by the FIA.
We suggest that the overspend should be penalised by way of a reduction to the team's cost cap in the year following the ruling, and the penalty should be equal to the overspend plus a further fine. I.e, an overspend of $2 million in 2021, which is identified in 2022, would result in a $4 million deduction in 2023. ($2 million to offset the overspend plus a $2 million fine).
For context, $2 million is 25-50% [of an] upgrade to the annual car-development budget and hence would have a significant positive and long-lasting benefit. In addition, we believe there should be minor penalties of a 20% reduction in CFD and wind tunnel time. These should be enforced in the following year to mitigate against the unfair advantage the team has and will continue to benefit from.
To avoid teams accumulating and benefiting from the multiplier effect of several minor overspend breaches, we suggest that a second minor overspend breach automatically moves the team to a major breach.
Finally, given the financials involved, a 5% threshold for a minor overspend breach seems far too large of a variance. We suggest a lower threshold, 2.5%, is more appropriate. It is paramount that the cost cap continues to be governed in a highly transparent manner, both in terms of the details of any violations and related penalties."
