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

Debate contribution by Mr Peter Martin on 28 September 2026.

MLA: Mr Peter Martin
Party at the time: Democratic Unionist Party
Date: 28 September 2026
Type: Debate contribution
Business: Private Members' Business
Heading: Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill: Second Stage
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5762745

Text

I thank the Member for taking an intervention. The Bill sponsor raised an interesting point. He did not name the therapeutic organisations that use exploratory counselling, but I probably know the ones to which was referring. Is the Member aware that NHS services in England have used an LGBTQI+-affirmative approach? I do not think that they use it now, but they did through most of the 2010s.
For example, an NHS talking therapy service describes its LGBT+ programme as an "affirmative stance" in which "therapists", who, I assume, are those to whom the Bill sponsor refers, aim to "accept, affirm" and support people's "sexual and gender identities". That is widespread. Therefore, I imagine that, in the past, the organisations in the Bill sponsor's list have probably used exactly that approach, which is fine for them because they are affirming a gender identity that the person has presented to them, but I do not think that that is the sort of counselling that I want to see, which is not affirmative-plus. I want actual counselling for a young person who presents and for them to be talked through gender-questioning ideals. In the past, we have seen the LGBTQI+-affirmative approach in the UK. I asked the Health Minister about it when we were talking about puberty blockers, and he assured me that it was not being used and had been stopped in Northern Ireland. It had been used consistently for a number of years in England. I do not share the Bill sponsor's confidence in his list of organisations, because, in the past, some in that list may have used exactly that approach.

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

Assessment

Not qualifying

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

Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.32 (qualifying needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not qualifying).
None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.80).
No identity-based framing was identified (0.58).
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	0.14	No
Sectarian or communal antagonism	0.13	No
Cultural grievance politics	0.05	No
Dog-whistle messaging	0.44	No
Controversy escalation	0.19	No
Legitimate policy scrutiny	0.80	Yes
Overall judgement	0.32	Between thresholds

Context and attribution (stance)
Option	Probability
No identity-based framing (chosen)	0.58
Reports or questions it	0.28
Criticises or condemns it	0.01
Adopts it	0.13

Subject area (top five)
Subject	Probability
Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues	1.00
No identity-related subject	0.00
Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials	0.00
Parades, bonfires and commemorations	0.00
Irish language, Ulster-Scots and language policy	0.00

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 01:21 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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