PM has spoken to ECB leaders after damning report

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has spoken to leaders at the England and Wales Cricket Board after a report highlighted discrimination in cricket.

“For people who love cricket that was hard to read,” said Sunak.

“My first reaction was that it is really sad to see a sport I love being described like that.”

The ICEC was announced by the ECB in March 2021 in the wake of global movements such as Black Lives Matter and Me Too.

The damning report made 44 recommendations, including that the ECB makes an unreserved public apology for its failings. ECB chair Richard Thompson apologised on Tuesday.

“I’ve spoken to the team at the ECB and I think they have approached it in the right way,” Sunak told BBC Test Match Special during the second Ashes Test at Lord’s.

“They commissioned this report off their own back because they wanted to be proactive, so they deserve credit for that.

“From conversations I have had, they are absolutely committed to fixing the problems and for this to be a reset moment for cricket.

“We all want it to be open for everybody from all backgrounds and where everybody can feel respected and supported when playing it.

“I’m confident the leadership of the whole cricketing family share that ambition.”

Sunak said he will monitor the ECB’s response to the report in the coming months.

“I want to see cricket to be inclusive and open to everybody,” he said. “I don’t want to pre-empt how the ECB will respond.”

The ICEC criticised the lack of cricket in state schools, saying a talent pathway structurally aligned to private schools is partly to blame for “elitism and class-based discrimination”.

Sunak praised the African Caribbean Engagement Programme (ACE), which helps young people from more diverse communities into the game, and was asked how cricket could be brought back into state schools when many pitches had been sold off by a series of governments.

He said: “We as a government have put more money into school sports – £600m over the next couple of years. The government, typically, doesn’t dictate what sports schools should play.

“After meeting the Lionesses [the England women’s football team] we did support their campaign to make sure girls had access to the same sports as boys, as well as a minimum amount of sport we want all schools to do.”

Sunak spoke of his own childhood playing and watching cricket. He said he had not experienced racism in the game but had in wider society.

“There are instances in your childhood that stay with you,” he said.

“But those instances I suffered as a child don’t think would happen to my kids today because we have made incredible progress as a country.

“Of course there are pockets where we are not doing as well and we have to strive to be better.”

Sunak was also asked about the pressures of running the country and admitted it “weighs very heavily”.

“When we have inflation at the levels it is at, the impacts on pay packets, budgets and what people can do for their kids,” he added.

“It is my responsibility to fix it and make the situation better.”

The prime minister distanced himself from his predecessors, saying he wanted to “act with integrity” when asked how he would restore trust in politicians.

He said: “There are lots of ways you can do that, acting with integrity, doing the right thing and doing the things you say.”