ECB remit prevented participation in initial Azeem Rafiq investigation, says Tom Harrison

"We are the regulator, we either run the investigation in its entirety ourselves or we let our stakeholders run an investigation in the entirety itself," Harrison told journalists on Friday

Tom Harrison has refuted claims made by former Yorkshire chairman Roger Hutton that the ECB “declined to help” with the county’s response to racism claims made by Azeem Rafiq.

Hutton resigned his position on Friday morning, apologising “unreservedly” to Rafiq for the club’s handling of the affair which, more than a year after an investigation was set up, has resulted in Yorkshire being suspended from hosting international cricket.

Harrison, the governing body’s chief executive, clarified the ECB’s position with regards to Hutton’s claims.

“What we were asked to do was join the Yorkshire panel to be part of the investigation, which clearly we cannot do,” he said. “We are the regulator, we either run the investigation in its entirety ourselves or we let our stakeholders run an investigation in the entirety itself.

“But a quasi kind of involvement being regulated and part of the membership of an investigation is completely against the role that we play. So, I'm afraid that I disagree entirely with that characterisation of that statement.”

He gave his personal view that Hutton’s decision to resign was “correct”.

The move to suspend Yorkshire from hosting major matches – they were due to stage men's Tests against New Zealand and Australia in the next two years, as well as a men's ODI with South Africa next summer – came following a meeting of the ECB board on the back of the developments in recent days.

The ban will remain in place “until it has clearly demonstrated that it can meet the standards expected of an international venue, ECB member and first-class county,” an ECB statement read on Thursday evening.

^{ECB chief executive Tom Harrison addressed the Yorkshire situation on Friday}

Rafiq, 30, played for Yorkshire across two separate spells between 2008 and 2018. Last summer, he accused the county of “institutional racism”, but they have declined to publish the subsequent report in full, citing concerns over potential legal consequences.

In September, the county released an overview of the case and admitted that Rafiq was a victim of “racial harassment and bullying” during his time on the playing staff at Headingley.

Yorkshire have also issued an apology to Rafiq, but no current employees at the county are to be disciplined as a result of the report’s findings.

That detail, announced last week, was paramount in the ECB’s shift to take “decisive action”.

Harrison said: “I don’t think it was about sponsors walking away or politicians becoming involved. It was about the game being dragged through the mud and the disrepute as a result of the press statement that was made by Yorkshire CCC last week that no action was going to be taken in response to the upheld allegations of racism that the investigation had yielded.

“I think that was the moment where we felt that we were going to be dealing with something very different – not a breach of regulations per se, but a breach of the set of values that we have in cricket and the strategy that we’ve adopted and the contract that you have with people about their involvement in this game, that unwritten contract that the game will be there for you. That is where the problem lay.

“It became very clear very quickly that we would have to take significant action because actually the message was that cricket is light on racism. And racism has no place in this sport. Any form of discrimination has no place in this sport. We need to take decisive action because Yorkshire have failed to do that, so we did.

“It was clear that with the response – and, indeed, the fact that Yorkshire had failed to take any disciplinary action against individuals – the board felt that it was time to intervene to address the serious concerns we had on governance and leadership processes at Yorkshire County Cricket Club, which was leading the game into serious disrepute.”

Harrison confirmed that he has not spoken to Rafiq in recent days but offered a message to the off-spinner, who will give evidence in front of the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport select committee on November 16 – a hearing which Hutton, chief executive Mark Arthur and Yorkshire director of cricket Martyn Moxon are also expected to attend.

“I think of Azeem a lot,” he said, “and of what he has been going through for a long time. I think now it feels like this is some vindication for Azeem. We’ve apologised as a sport to him, that’s something that our chairman (Ian Watmore) did before he departed, and I’ve also said the same thing in terms of apologising to Azeem for what he went through as a player when he was playing for Yorkshire.

^{Yorkshire's chairman Roger Hutton resigned on Friday}

“My message is, once again, that I hope that Azeem can see, frustrating as it must have been given the length of time this has taken, he can see how serious the ECB is about matters relating to race in cricket.

“I think that his patience is probably very short and I would understand that. But I hope in time that Azeem can become a person for whom cricket is part of his life again, without feeling that the game has let him down in a big way.

“So, my message to him, is I hope he’s okay. And that he feels that appropriate action is now being taken, albeit probably later than he would have liked.”

In the last 48 hours, several major sponsors have withdrawn their support of Yorkshire.

On Thursday, Nike – the county’s kit supplier – ended its partnership with Yorkshire, while Leeds Beckett University paused their relationship and Harrogate Water ended their association.

A day earlier, Emerald Group, Yorkshire Tea and Tetley’s all ended their brand relationships with the county.

Sports and leisure provider David Lloyd Clubs have also brought their partnership with Yorkshire to an end, having previously suspended the partnership earlier in the year, while Anchor, the butter brand owned by Arla Foods, announced the end to their association with the club on November 2.

Publishing company Emerald will continue their financial commitment to the stadium, which is shared with rugby league side Leeds Rhinos, but will no longer sponsor Yorkshire.

The ECB board has also requested that the ECB executive commission a review of Yorkshire’s governance to consider whether it is fit for purpose, while the Cricket Discipline Commission will determine Rafiq’s allegations at an independent tribunal.

Of the ECB’s own ongoing investigation, for which a specialist QC has been recruited to oversee the work, Harrison added: “I expect it to be a very thorough and full investigation.”

He said: “There are going to be a lot of people from a lot of different backgrounds and cultures who have looked at what’s been happening over the last few days and feel very uncomfortable about whether they want their children or their partner or themselves to be in cricket if the kind of response is the sort of response that you can expect that we’ve seen this week from Yorkshire County Cricket Club. We have had to step into that in the most direct way that we can and take unprecedented action in defending the values of the sport and reassuring families and our cricket fans.”

A separate review has been commissioned by the ECB to be led by the Independent Commission for Equity in Cricket (ICEC), focusing on the sport’s relationship with gender, race and social class.

^{The Azeem Rafiq inquiry has still not been released by Yorkshire}

“I don’t expect the next few months to be comfortable,” said Harrison, “nor do I expect the work of the ICEC to be comfortable for the governing body of cricket – we know we have work to do in this space we are committed to getting it done no matter how difficult it is.

“What this issue has highlighted is that we have a long way to go, but it shouldn’t deflect from the good work being done, the growth that is being achieved, or in fact that strong action is being taken in response to this where trust has been breached, where there is a fault line, where there are problems. The message we’re sending out is we are taking action and we will listen. We hope this is the start of things. I don’t know if that's a crossroads but it’s an opportunity to reaffirm what we stand for as a sport.”

In Hutton’s departure statement, he criticised the “constant unwillingness” of senior executives at Yorkshire to apologise or accept change, urging them to fall on their sword in order for the game to move forward.

Harrison would not comment on the future of those individuals, adding that “we know it wasn’t handled well, but it’s not for us to decide who goes and who stays at Yorkshire”. But if Arthur and Moxon were to stay in their posts, however, and former chairman Colin Graves were to return as a replacement for Hutton – as has been speculated – then Yorkshire would be moving forward with the same senior management team as in the majority of the period of Rafiq’s complaints.

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