Scots activists push for more expansive ‘conversion practices’ Bill

A coalition of LGBT activists in Scotland are complaining that Westminster’s proposed ‘conversion practices’ ban does not go far enough.

In a letter to Scottish Ministers, groups including LGBT Youth Scotland, Scottish Trans, and the Equality Network claimed that the Conversion Practices Draft Bill for England and Wales “fails to adequately address all forms of conversion practices”.

The measures have already been criticised for extending far beyond banning abusive practices. The Christian Institute has warned that the Bill risks criminalising prayer, parental guidance, expressions of concern and pastoral conversations regarding sexuality and gender identity.

The Scottish Government previously pledged to publish legislation “should a UK-wide approach not be achievable”.

‘Criminalise speech’

Columnist Euan McColm warned that while activists want the public to envision people being “strapped down, beaten and bullied”, they in fact “wish to make failure to affirm another’s belief that they can change sex a criminal offence”.

Writing in The Daily Mail, he explained: “The truth is that the things we might think of as ‘conversion practices’ are already illegal. Coercive control, emotional abuse, physical restraint, torture… all of these horrifying things, and more, are already illegal.

“But the proposed new law is not about stopping the barbaric treatment of others. Rather, it represents a sinister attempt to criminalise thought and speech within the home.”

The columnist highlighted that such legislation would be “weaponised against parents”, where “any attempt to have a child discuss the reasons they may believe themselves to be trans would, because of the absence of affirmation, be considered a ‘conversion practice’”.

Parents

Earlier this month, Peers warned that the Government’s plans to ban so-called conversion practices risk “criminalising people who have done nothing wrong”.

Baroness Cash stated: “That drafting and those terms would put in question a wife who asks her husband to stop wearing her clothes, or parents who tell their child that they will not fund puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones, or a school that insists on referring to all its pupils as girls and boys.”

She also criticised the “weak” evidence base for the proposals, with “preposterous” claims of tens of thousands of exorcisms, “flawed methodology”, and relying on a Galop report, which admitted that the cases they found were already aligned with existing offences.

The Lord Bishop of Leicester also highlighted the danger to church leaders, and the “lack of clarity on the difference between harmful conversion practices and perfectly acceptable practices of pastoral care and indeed prayer”.