Alan Jones to possibly stop steward role being “disillusioned” over current F1

Stewards have been quite a dominant feature of this year’s F1 season, having penalised Sebastian Vettel while he was leading in Canada after coming back onto track off grass in front of Lewis Hamilton, losing the race being one of the biggest decisions.

Two races later Max Verstappen performed a risky overtake on Charles Leclerc for the lead, pushing the Ferrari driver to edge causing him to go off track.
 
Jones has been on the stewards panel before but not since the start of 2018 and doesn’t quite agree with some of the decisions currently.
 
He said to Speedcafe.com: “At the end of the day I’m a little bit, shall we say, disillusioned with Formula 1 at the moment, to the extent where I’m seriously thinking of relinquishing my stewardship.
 
“I wholeheartedly disagree with a lot of the ways or the directions that they’re going, and obviously you can’t s**t-can them or criticise them if you’re an employee of them, so if I’m an FIA steward, I can hardly turn around and get stuck into them.”
 
The 1980 World Champion believes that more judgement should be used for the decisions made by the stewards rather than just what the book says.
 
“They hand out a book, which is the steward’s book, and page five, paragraph three, line four says that if the battery lead falls off, this is the penalty that will be handed out,” Jones added.
 
“The steward should be there to have a certain amount of discretion, and at the end of the day, why have an ex-driver in the steward’s room if you can’t say to them, ‘No, I honestly believe that was a racing accident’, or whatever?
 
“I don’t think that it should all be down to a manual.”