NI Minister: ‘Conversion therapy plans risk criminalising ordinary parenting’

A proposed ban on so-called conversion therapy would be “guaranteed to frighten people into silence”, Northern Ireland’s Minister for Communities has warned.

Gordon Lyons MLA emphasised that Eóin Tennyson’s Member’s Bill, which is set to be debated for the first time in Stormont next week, “puts ordinary family life, religious practice, and honest conversations in the crosshairs of the criminal law”.

Under the Alliance MLA’s proposals, parents and church leaders could face up to two years in prison if they are deemed to be intending “to change or suppress sexual orientation or gender identity”. This, for example, could include refusing a child’s request for puberty blockers.

Censorship

Mr Lyons explained: “Take a mother or father who tells their child, worried about their identity, to slow down and think it through before making life-changing decisions. Under Alliance’s proposals, that could be read as an attempt to ‘suppress’ a gender identity – a parent doing their job, facing up to two years in prison for it.”

“Or take a preacher in his own pulpit, teaching what his church has taught for two thousand years about marriage and sexuality. Legal advice has warned this Bill would have a ‘chilling effect’ on the ability of churches simply to preach. A minister should not need to consult a solicitor before delivering a sermon.”

He concluded: “This isn’t a Bill that targets abuse. Abuse is already illegal. This is a Bill that targets belief, conscience, and normal conversation, dressed up as compassion. Legal advice commissioned called it ‘jellyfish legislation’ – impossible to define but guaranteed to frighten people into silence”.

Prayer

Speaking earlier this year, The Christian Institute’s NI Policy Officer, James Kennedy, stated that there “simply isn’t a need for a new law”.

“When the Communities Department paid academics from Queen’s University Belfast and Ulster University to look into the problem, they struggled for months to find participants. In the end, only ten were found, and not one of their accounts suggested legal change is needed.

“One person had experienced ‘prayer, Bible studies and teaching’ and another was discouraged from gender transition by someone in a supermarket. Are these really the sorts of things politicians want to outlaw at the behest of activists?”