Toto Wolff calls for more transparency after ‘basic’ Christian Horner investigation statement

Toto Wolff has said more transparency is needed after a “basic” statement was given by Red Bull in regards to Christian Horner.

Red Bull GmbH cleared their team principal following an investigation into him regarding alleged inappropriate behaviour, a claim Horner has always denied.

But Wolff was left unsatisfied by the statement which consisted of just 89 words and he said more was needed to be done.

Toto Wolff criticises Red Bull lack of transparency over Christian Horner

Wolff was speaking during a press conference less than 24 hours after the statement had been released by Red Bull and described it as “basic.”

“My personal opinion is we can’t really look at the behind the curtain,” he told media including PlanetF1.com. “At the end of the day there is a lady in an organisation that has spoken to HR and said there is an issue and it was investigated and yesterday the sport has received a message ‘it’s all fine. We’ve looked at it.’

“I believe that with the sport as a global sport, on such critical topics, it needs more transparency and I wonder what the sport’s position is? We are competitors, we are a team and we can have our own personal opinions or not.

“But it’s more like a general reaction or action that we as a sport need. We need to assess what is right in that situation, what is wrong.”

Wolff was pressed further on the matter and said it posed a potential acquisition of what F1 stands for.

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“We are being asked questions as competitors here and are we talking as competitors?” he asked. “Are we talking with the right moral approach, with the values based on the speculations that are out there?

“But I just simply think that as a sport, we cannot afford to leave things in the opaque on critical topics like this because it’s going to catch us out eventually.

“We are in a super transparent world eventually, things are going to happen and I think we have to. The organisation has the duty to say, ‘Well, we’ve looked at it and it’s okay and then we can move on.’

“And I think it’s sometimes very short sighted to try to suppress it but [I am] not saying this has happened.

“We’re standing from the outside and just looking at statements or press releases or timelines. It just seems that it’s a bit not as modern as things go in this world, in the real world out there. But maybe in Formula 1, we just have a little problem and we think that’s okay.”

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