Sebastian Vettel proposes radical alternative to F1’s budget cap

Vettel, who campaigns for environmental causes, believes that the system should be shaped so that F1 can ‘do great things’ with the money the sport generates

Sebastian Vettel has proposed Formula One scraps budget and salary caps and instead implements a profit cap on each team, which once exceeded would generate money for good causes.

The biggest teams on the grid – Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari – have called for F1’s budget cap to be raised at a time when the cost of travel is rising significantly and squeezing their costs, while the smaller teams have urged the cap, which is meant to help level the playing field, to be retained.

There has also been debate around introducing a salary cap for drivers, but Vettel, who campaigns for environmental causes, believes that the system should be shaped so that F1 can “do great things” with the money the sport generates.

“It’s just a funny coincidence that it’s the first time teams can make money with racing in Formula 1 and then something like the salary cap for drivers pops up,” said Vettel, speaking to The Race. “Just thinking ‘isn’t that funny?’ It’s interesting if you follow where it’s coming from, this proposal.

“Obviously we have a budget cap now which pushes the model towards earnings for all the teams. I think maybe they should be capped in terms of having certain fixed earnings and everything beyond that should go to a certain pool to do great things with it and have a positive impact.

“I can imagine the response will be that the topic will disappear. So I’ll leave it to you.”

Lewis Hamilton believes a salary cap on drivers would be wrong as it would hurt the ability of young drivers to repay those who backed them financially as they were climbing the ranks.

“Many of us who have been here have been heavily invested in as youngsters and had to pay that back, which you would naturally want to do, so that for sure could impact in the future for the younger generation,” he said.

“We have to remember this sport has gone from like a $4-6bn business to a $14bn business. It’s consistently growing. The teams are earning more money than ever before. We are a huge part of that. I won’t be here for a huge amount longer but I do think about the younger generation and I don’t feel they should be capped.”