Ron Dennis’ team were hit with a record-breaking £50million fine and stripped of all constructors’ points for this year for their role in the scandal.

Only the immunity Mosley granted the McLaren drivers – Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton and reserve Pedro de la Rosa – in return for information prevented them from being thrown out.

Mosley, though, feels the whole affair has cast a stain over the sport, and that might not sit well with Hamilton should he go on to win the title in his rookie year.

“I think he will probably feel more comfortable if he wins a subsequent championship, which I am sure he will, without any of these question marks,” said Mosley.

“There was a big debate in the World Council about whether all the points should go – team and drivers.

“We discussed whether to take the drivers’ points from McLaren, but allow the drivers to drive, don’t interfere with their super licence and so on.

“The lawyers felt everything should go – drivers points and all – because they argued: how can you give the world champion’s cup to someone who may have had an unfair advantage over other drivers?

“They have effectively cheated. But the other side of it was, here is this brilliant world championship between Hamilton and Alonso.

“The sporting people were saying, ’If you interfere with that, you are spoiling a very good championship. It wasn’t the drivers’ fault.’ But there again, it never is.

“Very often, for example, a car will be disqualified from a race because it is a kilo overweight which will probably make no difference at all, but you have to have this principle. It’s the same as in athletics or anywhere else, if you’re outside of the rules, you are not in the game.

“So there will always be a question mark over it, there has to be, because nobody knows how big an advantage they had from that.

“But that they had an advantage is almost beyond dispute.”

When asked on BBC Radio 5 Live’s Sportsweek programme whether he was disappointed, Mosley replied: “Slightly. I feel that when history comes to be written, when people look back in 10 to 15 years’ time and when all the emotions have gone, they will say, ’Hang on a minute, we just don’t know what would have happened. Would Raikkonen or Massa maybe have won had it not been for this information flowing?’.

“That’s not good for the sport, but that’s just my personal view and one has to respect the democratic majority.”

Mosley has revealed he personally would have stripped the drivers’ points too, adding: “On the grounds there is a suspicion that they had an advantage that they should not have had.”

But due to the immunity clause in his letter to the three McLaren drivers, and with Alonso and de la Rosa both providing information in email exchanges between the two, no sanction was imposed.

“When I made the threat about the super licence, I also said if you do give us the information, we won’t penalise you,” remarked Mosley.

“This is something that happens in all commerce, even in criminal matters.

“It’s very usual to offer a witness immunity or an indemnity in return for information. It is sometimes the only way you can get the information.

“That having been done, and even though the e-mails were pretty damaging, I couldn’t possibly go back on that.”