Dennis Demands Cash for Changes

McLaren boss Ron Dennis has demanded 'cash for changes' after the FIA president Max Mosley revealed plans for future radical regulation reforms at the San Marino Grand Prix this weekend.

Dennis accepted the need for change to improve the show and admitted the sport may not survive if it fails to do so. But he insisted the top teams in the GPWC will not agree until their own demands are met.

The GPWC - a group made up of leading manufacturers Ferrari, Ford, BMW, DaimlerChrysler and Renault â€" have pulled out of talks with commercial rights holders SLEC to buy into Formula One. They have renewed threats to set up a rival series when the current Concorde Agreement that governs Formula One expires at the end of 2007 if they do not receive a share of the sport's revenue.

"What you see now has its roots back in 1997 in how the Concorde Agreement then was put together in that period...it's really all about equable distribution of the revenues," said Dennis. "The issue of the FIA statement is about costs. We have talked about costs a lot and we are always looking for ways to reduce costs.

"We want to bring our budgets down. But cost cutting is really a smoke screen in this case when the real issue is a proper share of the revenues. Any new agreement must go hand-in-hand with an equable and fair share of the revenues."

Mosley released a host of planned changes on Friday that include a ban on driver aids, lower power engines and efforts to make the sport "more affordable" for manufacturer and privateer teams alike. The ideas will be discussed with team principals in Monaco on May 4 but Dennis believes Mosley has concentrated his efforts on the wrong aspect of the sport if he wants it to survive.

He said the regulations proposal from Mosley was "about costs" and added: "The real priority is the need for a better show. We are too easily distracted from that objective."