Talk is cheap — and that goes for the so-called 'threats' of a breakaway in Formula 1 that dominated conversations behind the scenes during the Canadian Grand Prix weekend.

Reports that a possible breakaway series had been discussed during a Friday team principals' meeting with Bernie Ecclestone in Montreal first reared their heads in German media on the Saturday morning, after which the rest of the world's F1 hacks ran with it. The rumour intensified after a second, similar meeting on Saturday.

The job of a journalist is, of course, to report on what he or she has been told and follow up on the story once it has broken. There is plenty of evidence that various people fed snippets of information to whoever asked the right questions in the paddock. Trouble is, for those with ulterior motives it is easy to plant a story in what is a very competitive media environment.

This is exactly what appears to have happened in Canada.

It is a fact that the teams and the commercial rights holder (CRH) of Formula 1, represented by Ecclestone, want to formalise their relationship and the one with the governing body, the FIA, in a new version of the Concorde Agreement. This Agreement, in various guises, had been in place since the early 1980's and essentially governed who did what to whom and who got what from whom.

The latest CA ran out at the end of the 2007 season and although the current commercial relationship between the teams and the CRH is underpinned by a Memorandum of Understanding, there is no formal agreement and neither is the FIA part of it. So while the teams and Bernie have broadly agreed on how the money is split, the FIA can do with the technical and sporting regulations what it wants.

This is what the meetings in Montreal were all about — to try and unify the teams behind a new Concorde and submit the proposal to the FIA in the hope that the governing body would come aboard.

Because the FIA basically does not need to be party to another tripartite agreement (what would it gain from such an agreement?), it seems pretty obvious that the threat of a breakaway was designed to put pressure on an already under-pressure body who would presumably not want to lose its flagship series. And the media were convenient messengers to get the point across.

But a breakaway will not work. It has been threatened a number of times, including when Ecclestone and Max Mosley originally stood up against Jean Marie Balestre, but even then the duo knew it wasn’t feasible.

Why? Because the FIA has a century of history behind it as the representative body of world motoring and is recognised as such by among others the European Union. And it could make life very difficult for anyone who would be deemed to have undermined that position.

For one, a breakaway series cannot look anything like the current Formula 1. The FIA not only owns the term 'FIA Formula 1 World Championship', but its technical and sporting regulations are also copyrighted. Even though the body would be obliged to recognise such a series in terms of European competition law — as long as it meets such things as safety criteria — the new series would have to define its cars and the way they go racing substantially differently

Technical and sporting regulations for a new series could not just change some of the wording — if the concept is essentially the same as Formula 1, the owners of such a new series would be tied up in years of intellectual property rights litigation.

Also, all motorsport events — apart from some in the USA, that is — from club to world championship level are currently run under the auspices of the FIA and in the event of a breakaway F1-type series this situation would remain. However, it would be very easy for the FIA not to issue a permit to any event forming part of such a breakaway on the grounds of safety, or anything else. Should the promoter object, yet more litigation would follow.

A breakaway could always form its own governing body, much like Nascar in America, and there would be little the FIA could do about it. But again, the FIA would be unlikely to recognise any event, much less a 'world championship' under the auspices of such a body, leaving it and its series with very little credibility at all.

On top of this, competitors (teams and drivers) would in all likelihood not be allowed to take part in any FIA-sanctioned series or events, thus severely limiting their area of operation, earning potential and the scope of their sponsors' exposure.

Given the above and, I'm sure, many more considerations, it is highly unlikely that carmakers, privateers and sponsors currently involved in the FIA Formula 1 World Championship would seriously contemplate breaking away.

On the other hand, the current situation is not satisfactory and one can understand the reasons for the posturing.

The teams and the CRH would like to have a say in the framing of future technical and sporting regulations, because potentially these have a huge impact on the costs of competing in Formula 1. Does the FIA want to allow them that say? Well, that’s the crux of the matter, isn't it?

A new tripartite agreement seems the only way of ensuring a stable future for the sport, but before that comes to pass you can bet your bottom dollar that a lot more posturing is in the pipeline.