ED&I ACTION PLAN - THE OUTCOMES AS AT JUNE 2023

At Middlesex Cricket, we made a firm commitment to improving Equity Diversity and Inclusion long before the ICEC report was even publicly launched, setting up a dedicated ED&I committee at the end of 2020 and launching our own ED&I plan early in 2021, with a mission to tackle the issues we face within our own county.

That plan has four main principles to it:

To build trust between Middlesex Cricket and all players, parents, guardians, and stakeholders
To ensure the composition of the Board, management and senior playing squads reflects the demographics within the county
To address any bias or perceived bias, whether conscious or unconscious
To promote cricket as a vehicle for social cohesion in London, bringing communities together

Since launching the plan, we at Middlesex Cricket have been wholly committed to delivering it, and whilst there is still an enormous amount of work to be done in this area, we have made great strides in our quest to be as inclusive as we can possibly be. This work continues and categorically will not stop.

We are working more closely with our communities than ever before, we are taking cricket into areas where we haven’t before, and we have formed partnerships with leading stakeholders in this area to ensure we continue to learn and continue to improve.

The ED&I plan continues to evolve and will do so as we continue to learn and make good on our promise to be welcoming and inclusive of all.

So what have we done…

A few examples of just some of the work we have done in the ED&I field since launching our ED&I plan to ensure we move towards being a more inclusive Club are as follows:

We appointed a dedicated ED&I Committee in late 2020 to drive all activities in this area and focus on the challenges we need to address
We have maintained our firm commitment to Disability Cricket, holding regular trials for new players to join our programme and have been a driving force in helping Clubs become Super 1 Disability Hubs and Disability Champions Clubs across the county to provide more opportunities for people with disabilities to play the game. Our commitment to promoting Disability Cricket is an area we should rightly be proud of.
We have run dedicated LGBTQ+ workshops in association with Graces Cricket Club (a London based LGBTQ+ cricket team) to put on educational events and promote cricket as a welcoming and safe environment for members of the LGBTQ+ community to play or get involved in the game
We have been through a cultural change plan in the Middlesex professional dressing room, to ensure the environment is welcoming and friendly for all, with Stephen Eskinazi joining the Club’s ED&I Committee to ensure the changes we make are embraced and implemented at all levels of the Club
Following the DCMS Select Committee hearing into the issues reported by Azeem Rafiq of Yorkshire Cricket Club, we created a safeguarding disclosure process, where anyone with a disclosure or grievance could anonymously report their experiences to the Club, with us acting on and thoroughly investigating each case to a satisfactory outcome
We partnered with Recite Me, a leading accessibility software company, to embed accessibility software across the Middlesex website, enabling viewers with disabilities to engage more easily with our web platform, and offers translations in four key languages at the press of a button - in Urdu, Hindi, Bengali and Sinhala
We embarked upon a survey of former Academy and Youth players who had dropped out of the Middlesex system, to ascertain the reasons why they dropped out of the game instead of progressing through to the professional ranks, to give us an understanding of the challenges they face and to enable us to act upon them
The results of this survey led to the appointment of a dedicated ‘Transition Coach’ to help work with players in the pathway, making the transition from Academy player to Professional player a more seamless process
Our Men’s Professional squad now contains over 75% of players who have come through the Middlesex pathway, proving that the pathway transition process is deriving positive results
Our Sunrisers squad now has ten professionally contracted women’s players in it, with a commitment to increase this number in the future – providing a genuine route to a professional career in the Women’s game now for any young girls entering the Girls’ pathway.
We have changed the composition of the Middlesex Board of Directors, to be more representative of those we represent in the county. Our board now has four women in post and four people of colour – a significant evolvement from change from Boards of the past.
We are working with a company who specialise in providing software for people with Autism, to ensure a more inclusive, rewarding, and enjoyable experience for them when attending Middlesex matches
We ran a project to work with a group of 40 young Afghan refugees in Hallfield School, running engaging cricket sessions for them to help the acclimatise to their new lives in London
Our award-winning Street Chance programme continues to thrive, providing cricketing opportunities to those in socially deprived areas of the county in non-traditional settlings
Our Participation Team continues to deliver cricket programmes into schools, clubs, community hubs and cricket centres around the county, opening the world of cricket up to literally tens of thousands of young people every year.
Our All Stars and Dynamos national ECB programmes sees us helping thousands of young children every year pick up bats and balls to embrace the game of cricket
We worked in partnership with William Perkin C of E school in Greenford to build and open a state-of-the-art indoor cricket facility, The Wilf Slack Cricket Centre, with the primary aim of delivering cricketing opportunities for people from more ethnically diverse backgrounds in the local community – this facility is by far, the best facility offered by any state school in the region
We held our inaugural Festival of Inclusive Cricket in 2022 at Highgate Cricket Club in association with leading inclusivity charity, ‘Power to Inspire’ to showcase the opportunities that cricket offers to people with disabilities
In 2022 we worked closely with Shepherd’s Bush Cricket Club to hold their inaugural Heritage Day – a special day when SBCC celebrated the achievements of the many black cricketers who have made such an impression on cricket in Middlesex over the years
We were the first county to sign up to the Muslim Athlete’s Charter and make a firm commitment to ensure we educate ourselves and make change to be more understanding of the needs of our followers of Muslim faith. Working closely with industry experts, Nujum Sports, we have run a series of educational training courses and have visited mosques in London to broaden our knowledge
We have visited Sikh community temples across the county to further broaden our knowledge of the culture and needs of those of Sikh faith.
In 2022 we launched our Connecting Communities campaign, the fundraising launch of an exciting new charity initiative, ‘Middlesex in the Community’ which will be our new charitable foundation – allowing us to focus on this key area and fundraise to provide closer community engagement and provide further opportunities for people across Middlesex to play the game
Our inaugural Connecting Communities event, held at a mosque car park in Hounslow, saw over 50 young cricketers from diverse backgrounds come together for a morning of cricket with Middlesex and Sunrisers cricketers.
Both Middlesex and Sunrisers professional players are working with our Participation Team in attending local schools, helping to inspire the next generation of young cricketers across Middlesex to engage with the game
We have regularly given our wholehearted support to national inclusion and diversity campaigns in the annual calendar to show our commitment for vital initiatives like Black History Month, Pride Month, Rainbow Laces, Disability History Month etc
We are running Community Walk | Talk | Connect events across the county to ensure that people across Middlesex can learn about what we are doing as a Club for people in Middlesex
Our newly introduced recreational club forums have launched successfully, where we visit clubs around the county to establish what they, their communities, and their people want from us as a Club, and to clarify how we can help them better engage with their local communities
We announced that following our Connecting Communities launch event at the Hounslow Jamia Masjid, the venue has become Middlesex’s latest Core City Hub, to be used for delivery of the Club’s ongoing Community engagement programmes
We have launched regular recreational club safeguarding forums for local Safeguarding Officers across the recreational game to join and share best safeguarding practices in their own clubs
We have worked closely with our ongoing partner, Nujum Sports, to deliver online Ramadan training to all of Middlesex’s coaching staff
Late last year we joined forces with the other London counties of Essex, Kent and Surrey to launch Cricket 4 London, an initiative which aims to drive engagement and active sport involvement in many of the more socially deprived areas across the capital. More on this exciting initiative will be unveiled as we move through 2023
Earlier this year we announced the launch of an innovative ‘Young Persons' Advisory Group’ – becoming the first county to create a dedicated focus group of young people who will work with the Club and its Board to ensure we are providing a safe and welcoming environment for the next generation of cricket lovers
And finally in June 2023 we were extremely proud to lift the inaugural LGBTQ+ Cricket Festival trophy, as a Middlesex side comprising members of Graces Cricket Club went unbeaten on their way to winning the first ever LGBTQ+ county cricket competition, held in Sutton Coldfield in Warwickshire.

The Club is committed to making change. Without listing all that we have done, as you can see from the snapshot above, there has been a lot of work already conducted in this hugely important area. You have the assurance of all at the Club that Middlesex Cricket is committed to making positive change and to providing a safe, inclusive and welcoming environment for all within our county. This commitment is unwavering and our work goes on!