Harrison promises to transform the sport amid the succession of allegations regarding discrimination and says "dressing room culture" will be addressed
England and Wales Cricket Board chief executive Tom Harrison says the governing body have let the sport down amid the fall-out from the allegations of racism and discrimination across cricket.
Harrison was speaking in the third session of a DCMS hearing into racism in cricket, which had already seen testimonies from Azeem Rafiq, former Yorkshire chairman Roger Hutton and successor Lord Kamlesh Patel.
He appeared alongside Kate Miller, chief diversity and communications officer, Meena Botros, director of legal and integrity, and non-executive director Alan Dickinson.
Central to the enquiries made by the members of the DCMS regarded the ECB's lack of involvement in Yorkshire's investigation into Rafiq's allegations of institutional racism.
Hutton had earlier criticised the governing body for not involving themselves in the inquiry, but the ECB says that as regulators of the sport they were unable to act and that Yorkshire wanted to take charge.
"It was the chair of Yorkshire, Mr Hutton, who stated he wanted the international law firm to carry out the investigation," said Botros.
"He asked if the ECB would want to put someone on the panel. The ECB said that given it is a Yorkshire investigation, it would not be appropriate due to our role as a regulator."
Former Yorkshire chairman Roger Hutton wanted the ECB to lead the investigation into allegations of institutional racism
The law firm Squire Patton Boggs, which previously employed the former chairman, were enlisted to lead the investigation.
Though Harrison hid behind the notion the ECB merely regulates cricket, he did issue an apology for the scandal which is currently engulfing the sport. Since Rafiq came forward allegations have since surfaced from the likes of Maurice Chambers and Zoheb Sharif while John Faragher has resigned as Essex chairman after using racist language during a board meeting in 2017, an incident the ECB have pledged to investigate.
"I would say please understand that we are really sorry for the experiences you may have been through trying to experience cricket in this country," he said.
"We know we may have let you down. We will fix it fast. We know the survival of our sport depends on it.
"We will transform this game very quickly."
He added: "We have got a litany of issues to deal with that will help inform our regulatory process going forwards.
"There is a complex role for the national governing body as promoter and regulator.
"We do have processes that keep the independence of the regulatory process."
The CEO even suggested that while the ECB are keen to make progress regarding racism and discrimination that its first-class partners are resistant to change.
"We have been aware of the importance of this agenda – not just racism, but diversity and equity," he insisted. "What we have struggled with is getting our first-class game to wake up. If we are not in an emergency, we are approaching one."
Rafiq had earlier given an emotional testimony regarding the treatment he suffered across multiple spells at Yorkshire
As part of an emotional testimony earlier in the day, Rafiq had used the example of Gary Ballance - previously revealed as being included in the report - using the names 'Steve' and 'Kevin' to refer exclusively to black and Asian players.
Miller said: "We have a dedicated south Asian action plan and are seeing positive numbers. We have seen an increase of seven-28 per cent of boys in our pathway.
Harrison added: "We need to start to look at dressing room culture throughout the country. There is a huge effort on this from the ECB but it takes time to trickle through."
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