A Brighton MP is hoping to use parliamentary time to make conversion therapy for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people illegal.
Brighton Kemptown MP Lloyd Russell-Moyle is introducing a private members’ bill to ban LGBT Conversion Practices in the House of Commons tomorrow (Wednesday, 6 December).
Conversion practices attempt to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity, based on the assumption that being LGBT can be cured.
The unlicensed practices, including exorcisms, food deprivation, and aversive treatments such as electric shocks, have been widely criticised as being abusive, especially as they can take place without consent.
The Conversion Practices (Prohibition) Bill has nine backbencher Conservative MPs listed as co-sponsors, which Russell-Moyle says is a significant demonstration of cross-party support.
Russell-Moyle said: “Some of the biggest social reforms in this country have happened via Private Members’ Bills.
“I was overwhelmed with support from all sides of the House for this reform.
“Too many have suffered for too long; we have a responsibility to ensure no one else must suffer from this practice.”
A Conservative co-sponsor of the bill, Caroline Nokes MP, said that the UK would follow thirteen other countries, such as Brazil, Canada and Germany, which have banned conversion practices.
Nokes, also chair of the Women and Equalities Select Committee said: “The Bill will contain the appropriate safeguards for legitimate forms of therapy, but trying to ‘cure’ someone from being LGBT is abuse, and we must outlaw it.
“Thirteen countries around the world have implemented nationwide conversion bans, and we’ll be reflecting on those examples to make sure we get our ban right.”
The Conversion Practices (Prohibition) Bill will join 20 other proposals for legislation being laid in Parliament on Wednesday, 6 December.
All major parties promised a trans-inclusive ban on conversion practices at the last election in December 2019.
Leading medical and psychological bodies in the UK have called for a ban, with the British Psychological Society (BPS) warning that conversion practices are “unethical and potentially harmful.”
Some religious organisations have also backed a ban, with the Church of England saying the practice has “no place in the modern world”.
Although private member’s bills have a low success rate of becoming law, it could force a debate on the issue when the bill comes to its second reading, when it is debated in the spring of 2024.
A nationwide ban was proposed as policy by Theresa May’s Conservative government in 2018, but the policy was dropped.
When a ban was reintroduced as Conservative policy in April 2022 it omitted conversion practices for transgender people, angering campaigners.
The policy of a conversion ban was not included in the latest King’s Speech to parliament in November.
As this bill as presented risked criminalising talk-therapy for people suffering from gender dysphoria, it’s good that it was withdrawn.
Ideologues like the MP for Kemptown who promote experimental drugs and irreversible surgery as the only correct treatment for this condition must be opposed.
Fortunately you can be relieved that the experimental phases, plural, of these drugs passed many many years ago, and underpin your lack of knowledge on the subject.
A recent systematic review reported a regret rate of 1% following transfeminine and transmasculine procedures, highlighting that the current process is confirming and informing people’s choice comprehensively in a neutral, fact-based discussion. That is the “talk therapy” done correctly.
Opposition only works when you have a solid base to argue your statements on, in this instance, you clearly do not. I look forward to hearing your views once you’ve established a baseline.
The NHS has blocked the use of these drugs outside of clinical research situations, so your claim (which I note you provided no evidence to support) is factually untrue, and I suspect deliberately so in order to promote the same ideology which the MP for Kemptown supports.
You even contradict yourself in another comment, admitting that ‘Gender affirming as a whole is still a new concept and new research so coming out daily’.
It’s clear you are willing to make dishonest arguments in furtherance of your harmful beliefs, and I look forward to not wasting any more time engaging with you on this subject.
I’m not sure you understand what a contradiction is since both states can exist at the same time, since one is about drugs and their pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamic properties, and the other about gender affirming therapy as concept.
Attempting to strawman an argument because you don’t understand it is not very persuasive, so again I reiterate you need to do your reading on the subject matter, because I will call you out, respectfully, on your inaccuracies every time I see it.
If you’d like references you don’t have to be coy about it, just ask.
Very worthy, but what about schools influencing the future gender and sexuality of the underage?
What are Russell Lloyd Moyle’s views on this?
Is it a school’s place to step into these realms beyond mere education, rather than let youngsters grow up to discover who they are for themselves, protected by robust anti-bullying and stringent safeguarding while under the age of consent?
He would encourage it. In Queens Park Primary School children are taught they you can change sex at the same age they still believe in Santa Claus and they have stonewall posters promoting transgender ideology on the classroom walls. This is in his constituency.
As council tax payers I worry that one day we will on the line for compensation claims for this for all the kids we have allowed to be damaged with autism etc that just needed help understanding their feelings but were instead encouraged and celebrated as being different and were put on a pathway to belive they were the wrong sex which is normally irreversible.
It’s an interesting issue, and one where I believe the evidence base is still growing on when would theoretically the best time to engage young people in those kind for discussions.
Take conversations about sexual intercourse and the responsibility of those actions and when we start to engage young people about them, namely because that’s the age they become interested in those sort of things.
I think you make a good point in using a evidence-based approach to when body dysmorphia conversations should happen, so young people can understand what transitioning means, and avoid fear of the unknown, which always leads to bigotry.
I am afraid puberty blockers and surgery for minors amounts to nothing more than mutilation and state sanctioned drug abuse that affects the development of the body and brain.. One day history will not be kind to us for allowing this to happen. How can we discuss such legislation against this backdrop ? Once this is outlawed then we can look at what Russel wants to discuss.
Agree. They seem to be obsessed with child gender identity. I’ve also read that the puberty blockers used are also used to chemically castrate paedophiles.
I think more understanding is required. Gender affirming as a whole is still a new concept and new research so coming out daily in a phantasmagoria of different aspects to it. That research should be used to inform decisions and framework about the appropriateness, timing, needs, and pitfalls of such procedures.
Creepy man. This legislation was withdrawn because it would mean that a clinician trying to give counseling to someone who was a boy and thought they were a girl could be prosecuted. Typically, disturbing that he would try and ban this as it is a well-documented fact that many people are confused about their gender due to autism and suggestion, sexual abuse or being confused about their sexuality who are in fact gay. Many transition and regret it deeply as once they do they realise the problem is still there but the process has physically mutilated them and led to long-term medical issues as there is no way of changing sex. To not even allow people the opportunity to really explore their feelings with a medical professional is sinister.
So today we hear of gay children being converted into transgender children, so perhaps Russell has a point?
Maybe they thought they were gay, when in actuality they simply didn’t feel like they were the gender they started off as and it was a failing of identification first?