Opponents of conversion therapy ban Bill say ‘parents will be nicked’
A draft version of the Conversion Practices Bill would ban people from abusive attempts to change someone’s sexual orientation or transgender identity
Last updated 24th Sep 2026
Opponents of a draft Bill to ban conversion therapy have warned “parents will be nicked” if the Government presses ahead with the plans.
Criminal barrister Dennis Kavanagh warned that parents might avoid having “a kitchen table conversation” about their child’s sexuality or gender for fear that they could be arrested.
Simon Calvert, a deputy director at the Christian Institute, described proposed new Conversion Practice Protection Orders (CPPOs) as “sort of an Asbo for misgendering”.
The Labour Government vowed in its 2024 manifesto to “finally deliver a full trans-inclusive ban on conversion practices, while protecting the freedom for people to explore their sexual orientation and gender identity”.
A draft version of the Conversion Practices Bill, which the Government published earlier this year, would ban people from abusive attempts to change someone’s sexual orientation or transgender identity.
People who cause “serious harm” or “serious alarm or distress” by carrying out conversion therapy would face up to five years in prison or a fine.
Courts would be able to make CPPOs – which would be civil orders – to ban behaviours which risk exposing individuals to abusive conversion practices, and breaching them would also be a crime.
Former equalities minister Olivia Bailey, when she appeared in the House of Commons to unveil the Bill, said the proposal “does not remove anyone’s rights to freedom of expression or religion or how to parent, this Bill simply prevents abuse”.
Ms Bailey, now a Labour backbencher, is on a committee set up to scrutinise the legislation.
The committee, with six MPs and six peers, is expected to report its findings by January 22.
Mr Kavanagh, director of the Gay Men’s Network, warned that the Bill puts “the size nine boot of the criminal law across a kitchen table conversation that is already difficult enough”.
The draft Bill would not ban “health care practices” which might otherwise be conversion therapy, unless a medical professional “acts in a way that falls far below the standards reasonably expected of a person in their position”.
But parents have “no such defence, so the Bill creates a topsy-turvy world where inconsistent messages are being sent and the net of criminal liability is being inconsistently cast”, Mr Kavanagh told reporters on Tuesday.
He said parents might be unable to steer children away from using chosen pronouns like “he”, “she” or “they”.
He labelled the Bill “a con” and described a hypothetical situation where electrodes are used in a conversion therapy practice, which could amount to grievous bodily harm and carry a life sentence under existing legislation.
He said if lawyers used only the draft Conversion Practices Bill to prosecute the perpetrator, “the defendant would have a maximum of five years”.
He added: “It flies the flag and pretends to protect gay people but offers us paltry maximum sentences and an offence that wouldn’t trigger the connected architecture of those specialist offences.”
Mr Kavanagh said he was not making a religious argument “for Jesus” but warning that “parents will be nicked”.
He continued: “I want you to justify that to me and I want you to tell me why, as I say, a kitchen table conversation gets you a night in the cells.”
Asked by the Press Association how the Government could ease his concerns and still meet its manifesto pledge, the barrister replied the Bill could be amended with carve-outs for “family life” and “free speech”.
He said: “But by the time you’ve done all that, you have to ask yourself, ‘what actually is being prosecuted here?'”
He added that the carve-outs would give perpetrators and victims “all sorts of exclusions”, and questioned whether the proposal would “amount to anything worth spending legislative time on”.
Mr Calvert described the proposal for CPPOs as “particularly chilling, because that allows a court to impose whatever prohibitions, restrictions or requirements it wants on somebody who’s accused of being likely to commit conversion therapy”.
He said CPPOs “are effectively going to end up looking like a sort of an Asbo for misgendering”, referring to the former anti-social behaviour orders which were set up to tackle nuisance and disruptive behaviours such as drunkenness or intimidation.
He also claimed there was “a fairly anti-religious and anti-Christian motive for some behind” the draft Bill, adding: “That word ‘conversion’ is not taken from rugby or engineering – it’s a religious word.”
A conversion therapy ban was promised to its backers almost a decade ago, in 2018, by Conservative former prime minister Baroness May of Maidenhead.
The charity Galop, which runs a helpline for LGBT+ victims of abuse and violence, earlier this year published a finding that conversion practices “often intersect with or ‘hide behind’ other forms of abuse and violence, especially domestic abuse”.
The organisation found that in 195 cases dealt with by its support services between 2022 and 2025, more than two-thirds were recent or ongoing, so they are “not a thing of the past”.
Existing legislation has left LGBT+ people “unprotected against covert and insidious forms of abuse”, the charity’s co-chief executive Jasmine O’Connor said.
Jayne Ozanne, who has campaigned for a ban, said when the Bill was unveiled that she was “delighted and relieved”, but warned she was “concerned as to whether the ban will fully cover ‘praying the gay away’ and the thorny issue of consent”.