Norris, Sainz take pay cuts, McLaren furloughs staff

Michelle Foster
Lando Norris played a part in allowing Carlos Sainz to shine.

Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz will both be taking a pay cut as McLaren announced a temporarily furlough for an undisclosed number of employees.

As the world struggles to deal with the ongoing pandemic, many companies and small businesses are taking a huge financial hit.

Formula 1 and McLaren are no different.

While the sport has put into place several measures aimed at cutting costs, such as deferring 2021’s new regulations to 2022 and announcing that teams will race this year’s chassis next season, that’s not much help with today’s cash flow.

The teams are reportedly losing as much as “100 million” for every five races missed and so far the first eight grands prix of the 2020 season have either been cancelled or postponed.

Formula 1 has pushed forward the summer break to now to free up August when, or best to say if, the sport can get out onto the track.

As a response to the financial hit, McLaren has announced that a number of employees have been placed on “temporary” furlough while those who remain at work have had their salaries reduced.

Norris and Sainz were two of the first to volunteer to take a pay cut along with CEO Zak Brown.

“The McLaren Group is temporarily furloughing a number of employees as part of wider cost-cutting measures due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on its business,” read a statement from the team.

“These measures are focused on protecting jobs in the short-term to ensure our employees return to full-time work as the economy recovers.”

According to The Sun, none of the 100-150 staff working on the ‘VentilatorChallengeUK’ were not included in the furlough.

McLaren employs some 3,700 people with 850 of those working for the F1 team.

The BBC adds that Brown informed McLaren’s fellow F1 teams at a meeting on Tuesday as the sport’s bosses discussed ways to ‘protect the sport’.

While none of the other UK-based teams have taken up the government’s inniative to cover 80 percent of the wages of a furloughed worker up to a maximum of £2,500 a month, one told the Beeb that it would “most likely in the coming weeks – we are trying to minimise the impact on everyone.”

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