Liberal MPs are fuming and embarrassed over a push from within their own branches for the promotion of gay conversion therapy and removal of discrimination protections for gay people, with one MP describing it as a "dark" throwback to the 19th century.

The Victorian Liberal Party's state council will debate a motion calling for the law to be changed to ensure doctors "can offer counselling out of same-sex attraction or gender transitioning", as Fairfax Media revealed at the weekend.

The proposal, from a Young Liberal branch linked to veteran federal MP Kevin Andrews, also says the state government should give parents and minors "full information about the psychological harms of social, medical and surgical gender transitioning".

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A separate motion from the Geelong senior branch calls for "sexual orientation" to be removed entirely from the federal Sex Discrimination Act, enabling discrimination against LGBTI people, and replaced with the terms "man" and "woman".