Debate contribution: Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill: Second Stage
Debate contribution by Mr Jonathan Buckley on .
- MLA
- Mr Jonathan Buckley
- Party at the time
- Democratic Unionist Party
- Date
- 22 September 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Private Members' Business
- Heading
- Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill: Second Stage
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5741457
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I thank the Member for giving way. The Minister makes a very interesting point, because it would be not the law according to Eóin Tennyson's contribution at Second Stage but the law according to the Bill. The Member set out some of the loosely defined terms in a logical way. There is legitimate concern that a court's interpretation might well differ from what has been suggested in the Bill or by individual Members. It is about criminal sanction. The Bill includes criminal sanction, which is not something that we should take lightly. I think of the rule-of-law test, which is a fundamental principle of the criminal justice system. In the case of R v Rimmington, the House of Lords stated the principle in clear terms:
"no one should be punished under a law unless it is sufficiently clear and certain to enable him to know what conduct is forbidden before he does it".
The court recognised that absolute certainty is impossible but sufficient certainty is indispensable. The ruling in the case of R v Rimmington is relevant when we discuss the Bill, because there is no way that any court could be categorically clear about the intention of certain subjective language in the Bill when it comes to be tested in a court of law.
215 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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