This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

Banning gay conversion therapy has topped a list of LGBTIQ people’s priorities for the federal government going into the next election.

Improved safety in schools, a national mental health strategy and better protection of LGBTIQ refugees also rated highly as priorities in the survey of more than 2,662 people conducted by the social science researcher Sharon Dane on behalf of Just Equal and Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.

Some 93% of LGBTIQ respondents rated a national ban on “conversion” or “reparative” therapies as of high or very high importance, 94% wanted “equal rights and protections for all families in federal law” and 87% wanted to remove exemptions that allow discrimination against LGBTIQ people by faith-based schools, hospitals and charities.

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Some 91% said funding programs aimed at improving LGBTIQ+ safety and inclusion in schools was of high or very high priority and 80% said the same of “reforming policies and practices for assessing refugees seeking asylum on the basis of anti-LGBTIQ persecution”.

But when asked to rank priorities they rated as high or very high, banning gay conversion therapy was the top concern. Gay conversion therapy is shorthand for all forms of sexual orientation change efforts, which can be promoted by health practitioners, counsellors or religious groups.

Chris Csabs, who has started a change.org petition to ban the practice with 42,000 signatures, told Guardian Australia that the problem was broader than just therapies in a medical context and campaigners want to see “a public health campaign against the whole idea” that LGBTI people are “broken”.

Nathan Despott, the founder of the Brave Network in Melbourne, said the “ex-gay” movement is actually an “ideology, a vilification movement that makes false claims about the LGBTI community and how you become LGBTI”.

Despott said the federal government should regulate counselling services and use its control of funding to private schools and the chaplaincy program to ensure religious groups are not promoting ex-gay ideology.

“I’m a survivor of 10 years of conversion therapy ... I attended several group programs and counsellors but the bulk of the harm was done by membership of a local church group.”

While the ex-gay movement is mainly associated with evangelical Christianity, Despott rejects any claims that countering it would infringe religious freedom.

“It looks vaguely Christian but if you get down into the core assertions it’s pseudoscience, homophobia wrapped up with a Christian bow,” he said.

In April the issue of gay conversion therapy caused trouble for the Turnbull government when the health minister, Greg Hunt, refused to condemn Victorian Liberal members who planned to debate allowing the practice and the deputy prime minister, Michael McCormack, said he had “no view” on it.

A spokesman for Hunt said the minister was “utterly opposed to gay conversion therapy” but did not say what had been done to stop the practice.

“It has not, and will never be, policy under a Coalition government,” he said.



The only state with legislation attempting to ban gay conversion in clinical settings is Victoria, which has a health complaints commissioner with the power to investigate and ban unregistered practitioners – including anyone who treats homosexuality as a disorder.

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The Victorian Labor government has instigated an investigation into the practice, which the health minister, Jill Hennessy, says is “ineffective and highly damaging”.

Labor’s federal health spokeswoman, Catherine King, has said it will be a “personal priority” for her to see other states and territories adopt bans like Victoria’s.

In the draft platform for its 2018 national conference, Labor has proposed requiring medical professionals “maintain a strong understanding of health issues specific to LGBTI individuals and communities in order to prevent misinformed and misappropriated medical treatments and procedures” through professional development.