McLaren Face FIA Grilling Over 'Lies'

McLaren will stand before Formula 1's governing body, the FIA, on April 29 in response to charges regarding a breach of the International Sporting Code.

McLaren were found guilty of misleading race stewards after the Australian Grand Prix, which saw Lewis Hamilton being disqualified from the race.

Hamilton was at first awarded third place before being denied his points.

The meeting will be held in Paris where McLaren are expected to make an appearance.

"McLaren acknowledge receipt of an invitation to appear at an FIA World Motor Sport Council meeting in Paris on April 29, received this (Tuesday) afternoon," said an official statement from McLaren.

"We undertake to co-operate fully with all WMSC processes, and welcome the opportunity to work with the FIA in the best interests of Formula 1."

The FIA claimed McLaren knew it was lying when it told race officials that Hamilton had not been given instructions to let Toyota's Jarno Trulli overtake while the pair were behind the safety car.

The FIA also said that McLaren made no attempt to rectify its evidence under scrutiny.

The World Council is the body which disqualified McLaren from the constructors' championship and fined them $100m for their role in a spy scandal that involved Ferrari in 2007.

There is no limit on the action it could take in this instance if it was deemed serious enough.

Hamilton, who issued an emotional public apology after the incident, is expected to escape further investigation and punishment.

The world champion has said he was instructed to give misleading evidence by sporting director Dave Ryan, who joined him at the hearings.

Ryan, who has worked for McLaren for 35 years, has since been sacked.

The two were found guilty of "providing evidence deliberately misleading to the stewards".

Hamilton finished fourth behind Trulli's Toyota, who McLaren accused of breaking F1 rules by overtaking while the field was under the safety car's control.

Officials initially gave Trulli a 25-second penalty, promoting Hamilton to third after Hamilton and Ryan gave evidence he had not deliberately let the Italian through, and he had not been asked by the team to do so.

But McLaren's radio communication contradicted this - and after reconvening in Malaysia at the end of last week, Hamilton was disqualified from the Australian race and Trulli reinstated to third place.

 
Team principal Martin Whitmarsh, whose own job is under scrutiny, has admitted the team made serious errors in their handling of the situation.

He took over from Ron Dennis as team principal only on 1 March and has admitted he did consider resigning at the end of last week.

"It wouldn't be true to say that it (resignation) wasn't (on my mind) because at a time like this, you think about what you got involved with the sport for, and it wasn't for this sort of thing," he said in Malaysia.

"It hasn't been a great experience for me and it wasn't what I started out 20 years ago to experience.

"In the longer term, I can contemplate my future. It's not self-determining.

"It's for the shareholders of this team to take a view and it's ultimately up to them to decide what's best for this team.

"I'm not resigning this weekend. We've made commitments to look at how we arrived at this situation.

"We've got to learn from it and we've got to be better in future."