Transcript of Max Mosley's Press Conference in Japan

Max Mosley, the president of Formula One's governing body, the FIA, addressed the world's media at a press conference at Suzuka on Saturday to explain his plans for a Formula One revolution.

Driver swapping, weight penalties, qualifying changes and several other cost-cutting ideas have been put up for debate. But this was the first time questions could be asked. This is what Mosley said:

"The proposals fall into two categories - ideas to improve the spectacle and measures to save costs. Both are necessary because there is evidence that the television audience is declining and at the same time it is undoubtedly the case that the costs have gone up and the income is showing signs of going down, particularly for the smaller teams and therefore the costs need to be brought under control.

"On the spectacle I suppose the most controversial suggestion is the driver swap. There is a very strong case for doing it because if you can criticise F1 or indeed motor sport generally from a sporting aspect probably the biggest criticism is you might get a mediocre driver in an outstanding car and an outstanding driver in a mediocre car and you never quite know unless it becomes absolutely obvious which it does from time to time which is the best driver.

"You never quite know which is the best team. A lot of the time there is a question mark. If you did have this plan of each driver driving for each team once then the best driver and the best team would emerge and there really would be no doubt at the end of the season who was the best driver and which was the best team.

"It also has the fascination of seeing what certain drivers could do in certain cars, what people at the back of the grid could do in the best cars and vice-versa. We would never again hear drivers saying if only I could drive the Ferrari or the McLaren, I would be right up there.

"We would see exactly what they could do. Conversely it would be very interesting to see what the best drivers could do in the lesser cars. It would be very, very interesting.

"At every race there would be at least one car-driver combination which would be of great interest to the public. Fascinating. On top of that you have got all kinds of other benefits that spin-off from it.

"The case for that is strong. There are difficulties. There is a transitional period because of the contractual difficulties but even there, if everyone wants to overcome it they can.

"The driver himself is always going to be better off whether he is at the back of the grid or at the front because even if you are driving for the best team and going to drive for what seems to be the best team next season there is no guarantee it will be the best team.

"The kilo per point is the other idea. At first it seems to say you are trying to slow down the best driver and I was quite distressed to see in one paper the headline Even Mosley Is Against Ferrari. That is completely false.

"Whichever is the best team would win the championship with the kilo a point. It's just that it will take them longer and will be more difficult but they will win at the end of the season rather than the beginning.

"If they have half-a-second a lap advantage at the first race, they will win the first race but the winner then get 10 kilos so will be three-tenths of a second slower at the following race. Then at the third race he loses another three tenths now he's got a tenth disadvantage.

"If he comes in second the next best team, they get the 10 kilos, when they start losing it goes onto the third team so the small teams at the back will get closer and closer and they will start scoring points. It will be much, much more exciting. If you analyse it, and some of the teams are doing computer simulations of what would have happened this year had we had the system, there is no question Ferrari would have won but not by so much and not so quickly.

"So, provided it doesn't interfere with the result, you cannot object to it. It's a perfectly acceptable system. Bernie is arguing very strongly that it is a sporting regulation because if it was technical it would be impossible to get it in.

"If I had my way I would say we have got to have one of them. We can only make either happen if we get 18 votes in favour in the F1 commission. The reality is it could be neither or it could be one, but quite clearly you could not have both as that would be unfair."

Questions From The Floor

Q: This is becoming a circus. It goes against a culture of racing going back 100 years.

MM:

If you think it is a tradition of motor sport that it should be inherently unfair then I go along with you. I don't think there is any great merit in having something inherently unfair so one person has a much better car and always wins. I don't think there is anything inherently wrong with having a kilo a point if that person still wins the championship but takes longer to do it. If we can make it a bit fairer, bit more even and keep people in business, what's wrong with that.

Q: Should you not be trying to improve overtaking?

MM:

The problem isn't Williams and McLaren trying to overtake Ferrari, it's trying to catch Ferrari. What would happen with either of these proposals is that it would be catching them so there would be overtaking.

Q: You are going to fix F1 problems by fixing races? This is insanity

MM:

You are not fixing races, you are evening up the differences between the teams but still ending up by the same team winning the championship.

Q: Vodafone spend $50m a year because they get Schumacher in the cockpit. Why should they give $50 million to Ferrari?

MM:

I don't think they give $50m to Ferrari because of Schumacher, they give it because there is a very good chance Ferrari will win. I could name several drivers who could win in a Ferrari.

Q: Why is this happening now?

MM:

There is no doubt that when we go down all the way to the end of the season it gets very exciting, television audiences build up, but now we have got a problem that people have stopped watching the television. We have never had a problem like this before. Maybe it's because people got spoiled. In five years out of seven we had the last race as the deciding one, which is complete luck. The problem is Ferrari have done a brilliant job and Williams and McLaren haven't done quite well enough and still less Renault, Jaguar so on. When you are confronted with a problem like a falling television audience you should react. It's no good sitting there thinking they are all mad they should not switch the television off. If they stop watching we have got to do something to make them watch but on certain conditions that you don't change the championship. The person who won it should still win it. There may be other ways, but we need to change the sporting regulations so we make it more likely that it goes to the end.

Q: What can you do to force it through?

MM:

We can't force anything through. We need to get the 18 votes and get the majority of teams in favour. We are saying to the team bosses that there is a problem, here are a couple of possible solutions.

Q: How about banning team orders?

MM:

I am sorry, that is just so childish.

Q: How do you convince Frank Williams, Ron Dennis etc...?

MM:

We have to talk to them. At the moment people have not understood that this is not a question of slowing down Schumacher. Maybe when they understand fully what can happen and see implications and when it has been fully explained to them exactly how serious the situation is regarding television and so on maybe they will agree. In the end it is not us it is up to them. The FIA is not going to go out of business if teams have to stop racing. It's the teams. And even the biggest and richest teams are going to suffer badly if the smallest three or four teams go out of business.

Q: How are the viewing figures?

MM:

At the beginning of the season the figures were holding up pretty well. Then we had the Austrian incident when a lot of people said 'I will never watch it again'. The figures shot up at the next race. It was the biggest television audience in Monaco for a long time because everybody had been writing about it. Everybody turned on to watch. Since then, there has been a decline. According to Bernie it has now started in the last few races to be quite serious and he is getting serious complaints from television companies. They are in turn under pressure because there is an economic crisis and advertising contracts are running out.

Q: Has Tom Walkinshaw got a vote?

MM:

A matter for debate. It might be academic it might not. If the chairman allowed him to vote that could be a matter for arbitration. Bernie is chairman under the Concorde Agreement, but he usually hands it on to me. There are 10 qualified signatory teams that have 12 votes. If the teams are split evenly those votes go 6-6. If they are not the extra two votes go with the majority. There are eight votes for race promoters (four inside Europe, four outside), there are 2 votes for sponsors, one for engine supplies, one for tyre suppliers and the commercial right holder and FIA.