For most of us Ross Brawn has been a remote figure. When he speaks, he is to the point so we get information, but we rarely get a glimpse of the man. Now he has taken time off and almost the first thing he has done is to win the undying devotion of every enthusiast who receives the ITV coverage of races.

Ross has joined we couch potatoes, he has become our pal. He has said what many of us have been saying for years, which is how sub-standard is the ITV coverage.

Just about every programme on radio or television which can do so, invites the audience to send in their views. 'Have Your Say'. It's an exercise in 'outreach' or whatever is this week's buzzword, a pretence that we matter, that we're all chums together. The reality is that the messages are fielded by some junior researcher and nobody really gives a damn.

If they could, most TV executives would depute a junior researcher to piss and crap for them.

I don't want to dwell on ITV's coverage; if you receive it, you will have your own opinion; if you have a different link, you've probably got just as much to beef about.

There are two details which should strike a chord with anyone. ITV has a token female, Louise Goodman. To make it seem that Louise is really, really, part of the action, she has to wear a Nomex suit. We viewers are supposed to be impressed by Louise's suit even though we cannot help but notice that all of the engineers tend to be in short-sleeved shirts. We are being patronised by a producer.

Martin Brundle provides expert comment during a race and he also walks the grid beforehand. I know seasoned broadcasters who admire him as a broadcaster because walking the grid is a difficult job. He is under orders from a producer so, in Bahrain, we had the views of three Show Biz personalities, and that was it. Oh, he did find time to say hello to the Prime Minister of Romania before being cut off.

Many of us would have liked to have known what the Prime Minister of Romania was doing on the grid in the company of Bernie Ecclestone, but he is not a Show Biz celebrity. He is merely the leader of an independent nation with a population of around 25 million.

There were dozens of celebrities on the grid, 22 of them were sitting in cars, but we viewers are so dumb that we have to hear how much a Show Biz person was enjoying the weekend. Fly anyone to Bahrain, put them up in a five star hotel, treat their every whim as a command, then give them the sort of pass which allows then on the grid, and they are not likely to say they'd rather be curled up with a book.

Martin, who can do a brilliant job, was reduced to asking people inconsequential to the sport if they liked being pampered. The answer to that question is usually affirmative. Only a producer would require someone as accomplished as Brundle to ask a question that dumb.

I have criticised no individual from the public face of the ITV coverage, only the decisions taken in the back room. Someone selects the commentators, and decides the balance of their contribution. The director of race coverage changes from country to country and we all see the same pictures. What differs is the commentary team.

In Britain we now get NASCAR highlights on terrestrial TV and several things strike me. One is the amount of solid information the commentators give, but they have a back-up team who don't get mentioned.