Jos Verstappen has revealed how he would have handled the expletive row which resulted in his son Max being hit by an FIA punishment.

Speaking in the FIA press conference in Singapore, Max Verstappen revealed that his Red Bull RB20 had been “f**ked” after a wayward setup change for the Grand Prix – his choice of words landing him in hot water with the FIA, who awarded him a community service punishment which he served in Rwanda last week.

Jos Verstappen: Formula 1 is an emotional sport

With Verstappen’s vocabulary coming in for punishment by the governing body on the grounds of a recently-introduced rule covering the very broad ‘misconduct’, the row coincided with Verstappen also incurring the wrath of the stewards over his on-track tactics in battle.

Verstappen made it very clear that he found the FIA punishment irritating, and his father Jos spoke about the situation in an end-of-season interview with the Dutch publication Formule1.nl.

“Why did Max get a community service penalty for the word f**k and someone else a fine?” he said, referring to how Charles Leclerc had also used the word in a later press conference, resulting in a fine rather than the same community service punishment.

“The stewards don’t remember it all. I think there should be stricter rules in that area.”

With the row hanging over Verstappen in the final races of the season, Jos explained how he would have handled the situation if he had been in the shoes of the FIA President Mohammed Ben Sulayem.

“Oh well, at the FIA they obviously erred with those penalties,” he said.

“You can’t impose a penalty every time someone says f**k. You know what I would have done if I had been FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem?

“I would have taken the drivers aside and said, ‘Guys, watch your language’. But to play it all through the media like that…”

Put to him that it may have been down to egos clashing, Verstappen senior said, “The drivers are egos too. But talk to them and make it clear that they should use some words as little as possible.

“And then if it does get used once, they should just pepper it away on TV. That’s how it is, right? Formula 1 remains an emotional sport, you shouldn’t take the emotion out of it either.

“And you can use f**k in different ways. The word is fairly well-established in many countries. And as long as you don’t offend anyone with it, I don’t see it as a swear word.

“It’s just a bit childish of the FIA to put salt on every slug. They should also let the sport be the sport.”

Jos Verstappen calls for more consistent stewarding

Both Verstappens were critical of the stewards towards the end of the F1 2024 season, calling into question the neutrality of decisions made by FIA steward Johnny Herbert after the three-time F1 Grand Prix winner was involved in the decision-making leading to Verstappen’s time penalties at the Mexico City Grand Prix.

With Herbert also offering his opinions on the championship fight via interviews with online gambling websites, Verstappen highlighted the apparent conflict of interest and said, for the future, a better idea may be to have stewards with less of a connection to the paddock politics.

“I did talk to Stefano Domenicali [F1 CEO] about that too. The stewards just need to punish consistently,” Verstappen said.

“The same for everyone. Do not impose five seconds one time and a 10-second time penalty the next time for the same offence.

“It would help if there was a permanent pool of stewards. And no more former Formula 1 drivers either, but just people who have more distance and fewer interests but who, at the same time, understand what the sport is all about.

“With the same stewards every time, you’re also going to get more of the same decisions. So more consistency, that’s just better. It is the FIA’s turn. They need to step it up in terms of professionalism.”

With the driver stewards just an expense-based position rather than a paid permanent role, Verstappen said it’s imperative to make it a more professional setup to reduce this uncertainty.

“Choose a pool of permanent stewards and pay and value them properly,” he said.

“Now they get a small amount to be at a race and some do it because they can use the money. But I think you need to find people who don’t depend on that at all.

“In football, you have FIFA referees, they get training and courses and are paid well. The same should happen in Formula 1, of course. In this area, the FIA can still learn a lot from FIFA.”