Essex have been charged by the Cricket Regulator with failing to handle
alleged “systemic” racist language and conduct on the membership between 2001 and
2010.
The county have been charged with breaching Directive 3.3 of the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB).
The Cricket Regulator mentioned in an announcement: “ECB Directive 3.3 concerns conduct, acts or omissions which may be prejudicial to the interests of cricket or which may bring the game of cricket or any cricketer or group of cricketers into disrepute.
“It’s alleged by the Cricket Regulator that there was systemic use of racist and/or discriminatory language and/or conduct at Essex, in the course of the interval between 2001 and 2010, which Essex failed to handle.
“An independent panel of the Cricket Discipline Commission will hear the case in due course.”
Essex mentioned they’d absolutely co-operated with the Cricket Regulator and would proceed to take action, and that they intend to “participate willingly” with the Cricket Self-discipline Fee which can hear the case.
In 2021 Essex commissioned an impartial report into allegations of racist language and conduct made by Jahid Ahmed, Zoheb Sharif and Maurice Chambers, which was carried out by Katharine Newton KC.
Her report, printed final December, discovered reference to gamers’ ethnic, racial and spiritual origins was “entirely normalised and tolerated behaviour” inside the dressing-room tradition at Essex between the mid-Nineteen Nineties till round 2013, beneath the misguided perception that it was acceptable ‘banter’.
Essex introduced in February they’d sanctioned people in reference to Newton’s findings, however didn’t title them.
“While the individuals are not named to align with the anonymised report, Essex CCC takes allegations of racism extremely seriously and the measures are a further commitment to creating an inclusive and welcoming club for everyone,” an announcement from Essex on the time mentioned.
“Essex CCC have shared the measures with the England and Wales Cricket Board and reaffirms its pledge to promoting equality, diversity, and inclusion within cricket to prevent such incidents from occurring in the future.”
In July final yr, Yorkshire had been fined £400,000 – £300,000 suspended for 2 years – and docked 48 Championship factors and 4 within the T20 Blast over their dealing with of allegations of discrimination by former participant Azeem Rafiq, and a failure to handle the systemic use of racist and discriminatory language over a protracted interval between 2004 and 2021.
