Motorsport UK chair slams FIA for lack of ‘gold-standard’ governance
The chair of Motorsport UK David Richards has threatened the FIA with legal action, slamming the governing body for a lack of “gold-standard” governance.
Richards claims he was told to sign a restrictive new confidentiality act, as a member of the motorsport council, that imposed €50,000 fines for breaches and a fewer rules and guidelines on what classed as a breach, leaving it to the discretion of the FIA themselves.
Motorsport UK and their French legal counsel have asked questions of the FIA but are yet to receive a response, adding that they would take further action if needed.
In a letter to Motorsport UK members, Richards said that the FIA and president Mohammed Ben Sulayem have fallen short in their governance, adding that the organisation has not kept to the “gold-standard levels of transparency, accountability and integrity” needed in sports governance.
He said that he intends to “remind the FIA of their responsibilities and hold them to account on behalf of the sport and their members worldwide”.
The letter also addresses Ben Sulayem’s series of headline-making decisions and opinions, including: unpopular changes to driver conduct; a number of sackings, changes to the statutes concerning the ethics and audit committees, “unacceptable” remarks relating to the value of Formula 1; and sexist remarks, which the FIA said did not reflect his beliefs.
FIA committee “lacks autonomy”
“The scope of the audit and ethics committees has been severely limited and now lacks autonomy from the authority of the president, while the UK representative, who challenged certain matters, was summarily removed along with the chair of the audit committee,” Richards added, relating to news that some members were barred from a recent World Motorsport Council meeting over the refusal to sign a confidentiality agreement.
“Our Motorsport UK lawyers, along with our French legal counsel, have challenged the FIA on their actions by setting out a clear set of questions that the FIA leadership needs to answer.
“It is very disappointing to report that we have still not received an answer to these or the fundamental question I raised: where in the FIA Statutes does it provide for an elected member to be barred from a meeting?”
“We have informed the FIA that, unless they address the issues we’ve raised, we will be engaging in further legal action.”