Ban Conversion Practices
The UK Government officially published the draft Conversion Practices Bill
25 June 2026 marked an important step forward towards LGBTQ+ equality as the Government finally published their long overdue draft Bill to ban conversion practices.
Everyone deserves to be free and safe to be who they are. LGBTQ+ people are not broken and they don’t need fixing. After more than eight years of delays and broken promises, this vital government action to protect the LGBTQ+ community from harm is long overdue.
About conversion practices
LGBTQ+ people have nothing to be ashamed of and there is nothing wrong or broken about who they are. Their sexual orientations and gender identities are diverse and should be celebrated.
Yet conversion practices – that seek to change, ‘cure’ or suppress them – are still legal in the UK today.
Conversion practices include any medical, psychiatric, psychological, religious, cultural or any other interventions that seek to change, ‘cure’, or suppress the sexual orientation and/or gender identity of a person. Learn more about conversion practices here.
Conversion practices violate fundamental human rights, perpetuate discrimination, and cause significant long-term harm to people and communities. LGBTQ+ people deserve to be safe and be protected from this abuse.
The draft Bill is here, but this is just the beginning
While the publication of a draft Bill is a moment to be celebrated, this is the beginning of a process, not the end. Our campaign doesn't end here. The draft legislation will now go through a process of pre-legislative scrutiny, before being considered by Parliament.
We’ve been carefully reviewing the legislation and we’re pleased that the Draft Bill includes protection based on sexual orientation and transgender identity. With trans+ people being at higher risk, this inclusion is vital. The Draft Bill adds protections for individuals who identify “as neither male nor female or as not solely male or female” and people who do not have a sexual orientation. This would be the first instance of legal protections for non-binary and asexual people in England and Wales.
However, we have also identified some key areas of improvement which would ensure a more robust and effective Bill which puts an end to conversion practices once and for all.
Ensuring abuse is captured
The draft Bill would ban “abusive conversion practices”. This implies that there are some conversion practices which the Government consider “non-abusive” and therefore won’t be captured. All conversion practices are abusive, so this distinction is highly concerning.
It is also important for pre-legislative scrutiny to hear directly from individuals with lived experience of conversion practices to ensure the legislation captures harm that is happening today in the UK.
Possibility of consent loophole
The Draft Bill does not explicitly include a possibility for adults to consent to undergo conversion practices. However, distinguishing between abusive and non-abusive conversion practices risks creating a potential loophole where an individual could consent to undergo “non-abusive” conversion practices.
No one can consent to psychological harm. In all cases of conversion practices there is an imbalance of power, where the victim is emotionally and/or financially dependent on the person or group conducting the practice. This power imbalance makes genuine consent impossible. Ian, who went through years of conversion practices, said:
“When people you respect and trust offer you “help” at a time when you’re distressed and scared, you take it. In that sense, some might say I consented to conversion practices because I believed what I was told and went along with it. But conversion practices are inherently coercive.”
Healthcare services
We are concerned that the clauses about healthcare services need improvement. Legislation to ban conversion practices must ensure that doctors, psychiatrists and counsellors are not at risk of criminalisation for treating people wishing to explore or experiencing distress related to their sexual orientation or gender identity.
Legislation must also ensure that abuse carried out by a healthcare professional or under the guise of pseudo-scientific treatment is captured.
We are concerned that the definitions of healthcare services are not defined sufficiently clearly. There is a risk that individuals wishing to perpetrate conversion practices may simply re-brand as providing psychological support (using titles that are not subject to any regulation) in order to carry out abuse.
Donate to support our campaign
Over the coming months, we will be raising these concerns with parliamentarians and Government, campaigning for a Bill with no loopholes which could allow for this abuse to continue.
Your donations will help us brief parliamentarians and campaign for the improvements this Bill needs, helping to ensure conversion practices are banned for good.
