There have been two minor victories for the good guys in the politics of F1 over the last week or so. The first has been FOTA's cutting through Mosley's bully boy tactics of the threatened standard engine so that a reasoned and realistic debate can commence on the future of the sport. I will say nothing regarding the measures already apparently agreed as Mosley is quite capable of throwing all that away if he feels he needs to re-assert his power. But it is a beginning, at least.
Silverstone
The other was the curious affair of the Canadian Grand Prix. This began with the omission of the race from the FIA's calendar for next year - made without prior announcement or explanation. Naturally, this had the fanbase up in arms and Bernie was moved to explain that it was the result of "irregularities" with the contract for the race. Later it came out that it was about money, of course, and Bernie was adamant that the race would not take place since the organizers had not made all the payments due.
That was pretty much what we have come to expect from Mr Ecclestone but the next event in the drama was entirely unexpected. The Magny-Cours organizers announced that they would not be hosting the French GP in 2009.
Suddenly Bernie found himself confronted with a completely new scenario; someone was having the temerity to turn his own tactics against him. He was livid that one of his cards should be so rudely snatched from his hand, especially as the organizers made it clear that his exorbitant fee was the cause of the cancellation. The calendar was down to seventeen races and it dawned on the little impresario that this could easily be the first of many withdrawals by European organizers. When you are losing money annually and being constantly squeezed for more, there must come a point at which you decide enough is enough.
This demanded a re-think and it seems to me that it is no coincidence that, from being definitely off for next year, the Canadian GP is back on the agenda. Talks are going on between the Canadian organizers and Bernie, which is what should have happened in the first place. I must admit to enjoying the irony of the situation.
So we have two small victories, Mosley forced to take a more reasonable attitude and Bernie hoist by his own petard. But these might be indicative of a changing climate in the sport with Mosley's favorite bogeyman of the moment, the credit crunch, looming over everything. The manufacturer teams have at last realized that the only way to get the FIA to act sensibly is to present a united front, insisting on practical solutions rather than the wild excesses so beloved of Mosley.
And the Magny-Cours organizers have pointed out something that has always been true: you do not have to pay Bernie's price if you don't want to. Imagine if several other GP organizers were to realize that all this pain is really not worth it. Bernie could be left with precious few races with which to meet his commitments, the prospective new Asian races not being ready yet and creditors beginning to become insistent.
The fact is that Bernie needs the existing GPs more than they need him. For some time the main selling point for a GP has been the national prestige it brings, not the profit margin (which hardly exists for most races). And only the boom economies and dictatorships of Asia can afford the kind of money Bernie needs to pay back CVC's creditors. If the European GPs start to drop out instead of acquiescing to ever-increasing demands for more money, Bernie can forget his dreams of twenty GPs a year - he will be hard-pressed to keep the numbers close to the present 17 or 18.
With the British GP's future very dubious, Hockenheim muttering about not being able to afford to run a GP and Valencia a monumental flop, it seems that Bernie's reign as puppet master may be coming to an end. There suddenly seems too little time to get the Indian, Korean and Russian GPs up and running and power has shifted to the owners of the older circuits. So Bernie will be talking seriously to the Canadians - he needs them now, even if the manufacturers were not putting pressure on him over the North American situation (as I am sure they are).
I think we will see the Canadian GP re-instated on the 2009 calendar. As I have pointed out before, less money than you wanted from a race is still better than no money at all. Not only that, however. If the power in the sport has shifted as I suggest, when the Donington GP proves entirely unworkable, we may even have the happy prospect of Bernie going back to the Silverstone organizers, cap in hand and begging for a GP at any price.
Now wouldn't that be something worth waiting for?