Queensland becomes first Australian state to ban gay conversion therapy

‘No treatment or practice can change a person’s sexual attraction or experience of gender,’ health minister says

Practitioners face up to 18 months in prison (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Queensland has banned gay conversion therapy, becoming the first Australian state to do so.

State politicians voted to make the practice illegal on Thursday, meaning health professionals who engage in it face up to a year and a half in prison depending on the age of their subject.

Steven Miles, Queensland’s deputy premier and health minister, told the state parliament that conversion therapy was “highly destructive and unethical”.

He added: “Being LGBTIQ is not an affliction or disease that requires medical treatment. No treatment or practice can change a person’s sexual attraction or experience of gender.”

The ban outlaws attempts to change or suppress a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity using practices such as aversion therapy, hypnotherapy and psychoanalysis.

“There continues to be a need for education and further research on the harms of conversion therapies, as well as support for survivors of conversion therapies,” said Peter Black, president of the Queensland Council for LGBTI Health. ”It is important that there are penalties for this dangerous and discredited practice.”

A number of countries, including Germany and Brazil, have banned the harmful sessions either fully or partially. Israel took the first step towards an outright ban in July, when a bill passed the first stage of its parliamentary process.

In the UK, Boris Johnson has promised to bring forward a ban on the “abhorrent practice”.

However, some people who have undergone conversion therapy warned that Queensland’s legislation may not be able to tackle the scale of the problem.

SOGICE Survivors and Brave Network, in a joint statement, said: “Health professionals are only very rarely involved in conversion practices in 2020, and therefore must not be the sole focus of any legislation or response.

“Overwhelmingly, the bulk of harm occurs over time in informal settings ... not in therapeutic contexts.”

Additional reporting by Reuters