Debate contribution: Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill: Second Stage
Debate contribution by Ms Sian Mulholland on .
- MLA
- Ms Sian Mulholland
- Party at the time
- Alliance Party
- Date
- 22 September 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Private Members' Business
- Heading
- Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill: Second Stage
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5741056
Read the official Assembly record
Text
No, just a wee second, please, Mr Frew. On 1 June this year, the Education Minister stood in the Chamber and urged Members of my party to support the Education Inspections Bill at Second Stage. His argument was very simple: send it to Committee, allow scrutiny, allow engagement, allow amendments and allow compromises to be explored. Indeed, he criticised those who sat on those Benches for opposing that approach, noting that they had made the very same argument for other legislation that my colleague who is now in the Speaker's Chair had made. He concluded:
"it is interesting that the same argument does not suit now." — [Official Report (Hansard), 1 June 2026, p48, col 2].
I put it back to the Members on those Benches: the same argument does not suit now. It is fine for us to be implored to support a Bill that we do not wholeheartedly support, that we have problems with and that, we think, is dangerous to members of our community in certain ways, but we are told, "Support it to Committee Stage. Just support the principle", and then they lambast others for doing the same. I say respectfully to the Minister that the same principle applies today. If Members genuinely believe that conversion practices are wrong, harmful and have no place in our society, the logical course is not to vote down the Bill before scrutiny even begins. The logical course is to send it to the Committee, test it and improve it. Let us work together. Voting against the Second Stage is not voting for a better Bill; it is a vote against having a Bill at all. I move on to some of the parenting conversations that have been going on. As a mother, I know that parenting involves boundaries — not about Lucozade, and I will point that out. It involves boundaries, and sometimes they are hard and involve difficult conversations.
There are also worries — things that go to the heart of who you are as a person and who you were even before you became a parent. However, there is one certainty above all else, which is that our children must know that they are loved. That is at the core of parenting. If one of my children were to tell me something important about who they were, my greatest fear would not be who they had decided to be but that they would believe that my love had become conditional. No child should feel that the price of keeping their family, home or faith is denying part of themselves, but that is at the heart of what conversion therapy is about. During the debate, concerns have been raised about whether parents would fall foul of the legislation simply by expressing disapproval or disagreement. Let me be absolutely clear: that is not what the Bill does. A parent can tell their child that they disagree; they can tell their child that they do not approve; they may hold beliefs that differ from their child's understanding of themselves. None of that in and of itself is coercion. None of that amounts to the deliberate and intentional act of changing, suppressing or erasing a person's sexual orientation or gender identity to cause harm. However, if a parent or anyone else engages in conduct that humiliates, degrades, punishes, threatens or intimidates a person because of who they are and does so with the aim of making them deny or suppress a part of themselves, that is entirely different. That should be challenged. People should be protected from that. As a parent, I believe that there is a profound difference between saying, "I disagree with you", and making a child feel that they will be loved, accepted or belong only if they become someone else — if they change an inherent part of who they are. That is the essence of what conversion therapy is.
653 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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