Williams Chairman Adam Parr has urged the UK government to not take the motorsport industry for granted as it is a major contributor to the country’s economy.
According to Parr, it is worth upwards of over £500 million to the economy and employs 4,000 people directly, as well as many others in the supply business.
The UK is often referred to as the home of motorsport, including Formula 1, with two thirds of the grid based in England.
Parr says it is essential that the government and the public realise what motorsport contributes, as many people’s opinions are far from accurate.
“It’s essential that industry, government and the sport itself thinks very carefully about what it does,” he told BBC Radio Oxford. “If you look at countries like China, they start off at the low-end of the value chain with cheap labour and then build up from there. Already they are moving into airliners and sectors they wouldn’t have dreamt about ten years ago.
“They could well be doing motorsports on a different scale in 30 years time and, if we don’t take actions, we could lose the high tech industries as we have lost other industries. There is a high degree of ignorance amongst politicians, leading business people and the public about what we do” he added.
“Two years ago, when we had a leading sponsor – the Royal Bank of Scotland – people in the media were saying it was all ‘champagne swilling’, but for every one pound of sponsorship we received from any UK company, we spent £4.50 in the UK.
“We [Williams] employ 500 people directly and over a six-year cycle we had 3,000 UK companies as suppliers. We are making a major contribution to the UK economy.”
The former-Rio Tinto employee added that the sport itself mustn’t take it’s position for granted else it could lose out to other countries.
“There are countries around the world that would saw off limbs to have a motorsport industry like we do. If we sit back and say aren’t we good at something – brilliant and confident – we will get slaughtered.”
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