Contact Your Local MP – The Free Speech Union

If you value Freedom of Speech Freedom of Thought Open Debate Artistic Freedom Comedy & Satire Sensible Laws A Free Internet Workers' Rights Contact your local MP today and voice your opposition to online censorship.

Online Safety Bill

The Free Speech Union, along with other civil liberties groups, is deeply concerned about the Online Safety Bill. For the Government to try to suppress ‘legal but harmful’ content is a breach of a fundamental principle of English Common Law, which is that unless something is explicitly prohibited by law then it is permitted. Moreover, each successive government will be able to add more and more things to this list, creating an anti-free speech ratchet effect.

We urge you to write to your MP asking him or her to rethink this Bill. At the very least, MPs could ask the current Government to hold it over until the Autumn when there will be a new Government in place. This is a complicated, far-reaching piece of legislation that will have a huge impact on what we can say online and it’s madness to rush it through when a leadership contest is taking place. Some MPs have already raised concerns about the Bill, including David Davis, Steve Baker and Sir Graham Brady. With your help, many more will join them. Please send your MP an email today.

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Dear {{MP}},

I am writing to express my concern about the proposed ban on conversion therapy recently announced by the Culture Secretary Michelle Donelan. I oppose all coercive or violent attempts to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity and it is right that, as the Government’s own 2021 consultation briefing on conversion therapy put it: “Our existing criminal law framework means that conversion therapy amounting to offences of physical or sexual violence is already illegal in this country.” However, the present proposals threaten to have negative consequences for freedom of speech, particularly in relation to gender identity.

To begin with, I am concerned about the impact of such a ban on the freedom of speech of religious leaders, e.g., the bill could make it a criminal offence for a religious leader to tell a member of their congregation that homosexuality is a ‘sin’ or ‘haram’. In the state of Victoria in Australia, which banned conversion therapy in 2021, it is a crime punishable by up to 10 years in jail and a fine of up to £100,000 for a religious leader to have a one-to-one conversation with a member of their congregation in which they pressurise them to practice celibacy rather than act on their feelings of same-sex attraction.

The prospect of the state prohibiting, on pain of imprisonment, what a religious leader is able to say to a member of their faith about what their religion teaches about homosexuality is alarming enough. But even more worrying is the prospect that conversations between parents and children about their gender identity will be caught by the new law.

As Kemi Badenoch, the International Trade Secretary and Minister for Women and Equalities, has pointed out, it’s possible that a poorly-drafted bill would bring conversations between parents and their children within scope of the ban, effectively meaning parents who attempted to dissuade their children from having risky medical treatments could be prosecuted. In the state of Victoria, for instance, it’s a crime for a parent to refuse to support their child’s request for puberty blockers.

The risk is that various legitimate alternatives – such as referring a young person with a history of mental illness who identifies as trans to a psychotherapist before they decide to embark on an irreversible medical pathway, or simply encouraging them to pause and reflect – might fall foul of a ban on ‘conversion therapy’. In this way, a poorly drafted bill would force medical professionals to rule out treatments that they believe are in the best interests of some of their trans patients – forcing them to break their Hippocratic Oath. Former clinicians at the Tavistock Clinic have reported that they were subject to unfounded accusations of ‘transphobia’ for recommending a ‘watchful waiting’ approach and there is a risk that the bill would criminalise such advice. Doctors have both a right and a duty to recommend what in their judgment is the best clinical pathway for a patient who identifies as trans, particularly if that patient is a minor.

This is important, given that research on and around gender identity is still in its infancy, and it cannot be ruled out that in some cases identifying as trans may be symptomatic of a mental disorder – ‘gender dysphoria’ still appears in the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the Bible of the American psychiatric profession.

Nor can it be ruled out that an adolescent who identifies as trans and wants to embark on transitioning is simply being swept along by a trend within their peer group or on social media. If they are not persuaded to wait before undergoing a life-changing medical procedure, such as a double mastectomy, they may come to regret it. Is it really in the best interests of such adolescents to criminalise attempts by parents or clinicians to make them pause and reflect before permanently changing their bodies?

I am not in principle opposed to a ban on conversion therapy, although I have yet to be persuaded that the sort of practices that should be banned, such as attempting to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity through pseudo-scientific quack ‘treatments’, are not already illegal. But I believe there is a serious risk that if conversion therapy is defined too widely in this bill it will have a negative impact on the free speech of religious leaders, medical professionals and parents and, in some cases, that could lead to children undergoing life-changing medical treatments that they later come to regret.

As your constituent, I am asking you to scrutinise this bill very carefully when it comes before the House of Commons and make sure that the risks it poses to free speech are avoided.

Yours Sincerely,

Address: {{ADDRESS}}

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