Mercedes boss Toto Wolff issues stark warning over controversial F1 rule change proposal

Mercedes chief Toto Wolff has warned against changes to F1's cost cap which have been proposed by a rival team principal.

Williams boss James Vowles has proposed that teams who finish lower in the championship points standings should get more money to play with moving forward in order to help level the playing field.

Unsurprisingly, there appears to be a split in teams who are in favour of the idea, and those who are against it.

Equally unsurprisingly, it seems to be the teams at the top of the pecking order - the likes of Ferrari, Red Bull, and Wolff's Mercedes - who are against it. And change would require a majority of six or more teams.

Wolff admitted to media recently that he doesn't like the idea of benefits being handed out based on performance struggles (as is currently the case with CFD and wind-tunnel time), and warned against 'undoing something that we actually consciously changed a year or two ago'.

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Mercedes boss explains cost cap suggestions

"Where we stand," Wolff explained, "I'd love to have a little bit more room in the cost cap for lower salaries, a bracket, rather than buying new front wings, but give the possibility of paying a little bit more and being attractive as a sport.

"Obviously, it also depends on the size of the team. I think we agreed that is something we would like to do, but if you have the reality of the budget, a smaller team is not going to be happy about us having five million more in the cost cap to spend for PhDs. So that's the second point.

"The third point is that what James is alluding to is the CapEx allowance or the CapEx possibilities. Now, how the regs were changed was that rather than having this CapEx budget, your CapEx would go into operational costs, into OpEx.

"So, the consequence is the teams that spent a lot in the past on CapEx, like us, for example, have a huge amount of costs that we need to depreciate in the cost cap. The ones that haven't spent a lot obviously have much more possibility to spend on infrastructure or whatever you want to, what was CapEx before."

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Wolff continued: "So I think I have super sympathy with a team like Williams and with James, and he's super clever, but we just need to find the right balance of not undoing something that we actually consciously changed a year or two ago. So, yeah, it's just a forward-moving discussion.

"Personally, I don't like the concept of adjustment based on some positions. BoP (Balance of Performance) for me is like a red mist. We're having these tiny little adjustments on aero time, ATR, which is almost invisible to the spectator and hasn't been a big thing because it's really tiny.

"We have the catch-up mechanisms on the power units. If someone were to fall behind dramatically, then you get that opportunity, but it wasn't a leapfrogging mechanism. So, the job that the FIA have done in that respect I think, is very good.

"They haven't allowed any politics to creep in, people making noises that they wanted to do or not. I think they handled that very well. So, do we really want another mechanism where you're being allowed to have more CapEx, OpEx based on your championship position? I'm not sure."

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