Debate contribution: Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill: Second Stage

Debate contribution by Mr Peter Martin on 15 September 2026.

MLA: Mr Peter Martin
Party at the time: Democratic Unionist Party
Date: 15 September 2026
Type: Debate contribution
Business: Private Members' Business
Heading: Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill: Second Stage
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5706225

Text

I thank my colleague for taking an intervention, which is on the defence in the Bill that we are now calling the "reasonableness defence". She touched on an interesting point that is worth widening a little. I do not think that parents would want to find themselves in a criminal court, using a defence of reasonableness to defend themselves in the very situation that she described. Think about that for a second. The Bill sponsor is relying on that reasonableness defence to say, "It's all going to be OK. You can use this defence in a criminal court". The fact of the matter is that most parents who are listening to the debate and most parents who might find themselves in the situation that my colleague described would not want to find themselves in a criminal court, facing two years in prison if they were to be found guilty, having to go through that trauma and, perhaps, that of the person who brought them there, with the emotionality that that would bring to the proceedings, just to end up using a defence of reasonableness in order to defend themselves. Does my colleague agree?

193 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.

Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.31 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.84).
No identity-based framing was identified (0.96).
Subject area: Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues.
The overall probability was low and the text did not adopt any identity-based framing.

This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.

Jev’s structured answers

Probability that each statement is true of this text (0 = no, 1 = yes). A criterion counts as met at 0.60 or above.
Question	Probability	Met?
Identity framing	0.08	No
Sectarian or communal antagonism	0.06	No
Cultural grievance politics	0.02	No
Dog-whistle messaging	0.19	No
Controversy escalation	0.10	No
Legitimate policy scrutiny	0.84	Yes
Overall judgement	0.31	Between thresholds

Context and attribution (stance)
Option	Probability
No identity-based framing (chosen)	0.96
Reports or questions it	0.01
Criticises or condemns it	0.00
Adopts it	0.03

Subject area (top five)
Subject	Probability
Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues	0.95
No identity-related subject	0.02
Religion and belief (including people of no religion), churches, faith communities and religious prejudice (including antisemitism and anti-Muslim prejudice)	0.02
Another identity-related subject	0.01
Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials	0.00

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 16:21 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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