As reports circulate that a number of people at McLaren-Mercedes saw the confidential Ferrari documents at the heart of the 'espionage' scandal, the Woking team has moved to deny that this was the case. It has already been widely suggested that McLaren Team Manager Jonathon Neale saw the documents prior to 3rd July, although a date when he did so has not been revealed; now stories suggest the documents, which run to 780 pages, were shown to further people within the team.

Despite repeated previous denials by the McLaren that it was involved, the FIA has investigated and charged the team appropriately, summoning them to a meeting in Paris a week on Thursday to answer charges that they "had unauthorised possession of documents and confidential information belonging to Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro." The affidavit that was provided to Ferrari's London lawyers last week by suspended McLaren chief designer Mike Coughlan is expected to shed much light on the situation and it is believed to be the source of the new stories about the stolen documents had a wider reading within McLaren. However the leaks also suggest he hasn't actually named his source at Ferrari, but has stated that the documents were sent to the UK by courier mail.

The mounting speculation has seen McLaren rushing to issue another statement to dampen these most recent media revelations. "McLaren is concerned that erroneous speculation has arisen from inaccurate and misleading reference to the contents of confidential legal papers filed at court in response to Ferrari’s UK action to recover its intellectual property," said the statement. "This is unfortunate and is prejudicial to a fair interpretation of these matters.
 

"McLaren can confirm from its own investigation that no Ferrari materials or data are or have ever been in the possession of any McLaren employee other than the individual sued by Ferrari. The fact that he held at his home unsolicited materials from Ferrari was not known to any other member of the team prior to the 3rd July 2007. Furthermore, McLaren has categorically established that no Ferrari information has at any stage been used to develop its car. McLaren looks forward to having the opportunity to present the complete and accurate picture of events in the appropriate forum, that is before the FIA World Motor Sport Council in Paris on 26th July 2007," concluded the McLaren team's statement.

Also returning to the media spotlight in the past few days has been the mysterious white powder reportedly emptied into the Ferrari F1 car's petrol tanks just as they were about to leave for Monte Carlo in May, an act, which on the surface, looks to be a deliberate attempt at sabotage. Reports suggests that around half-a-kilo of 'powder' was used in an effort to damage the F2007's engines, and they suggest that the prosecutor's office handling the investigation in Italy is making progress on the evidence in this area. Speculation suggests that the now former Scuderia employee Nigel Stepney, who is also linked with leaking the confidential documents, was involved.