Mumsnet users fear bill will convert them into crims
Four in five in a Mumsnet poll agreed parents should have the right to tell children they are not “in the wrong body”, after a post warned the draft law could criminalise such conversations
Mumsnet users have spoken: four in five poll voters agreed parents should have the right to tell their children they’re not “in the wrong body” and can’t be “transgender”. Of the 898 users who responded to the poll posted last Thursday, 80 per cent agreed with the post and 20 per cent disagreed.
The post warned that under the proposed draft Conversion Practices Bill parents could face up to five years in prison for “denying a child or an adult’s transgender identity.” It also asked whether courts could order them to comply if they “objected to a child being ‘transed’ at school or elsewhere.”
Reactions on the thread ranged from outright rejection to concern about the Bill’s reach. Cascadia called the post “an insanely wrong description of this bill”, while BillieWiper dismissed it as “utter nonsense”. SweetPea1984 warned that the threshold for “conversion therapy” could be “misunderstood or misapplied in practice”. Imdunfer compared the Bill’s potential effects with children being prescribed puberty blockers after saying that not receiving them would harm their mental health, and asked: “Surely anyone can see that this law is going to result in children claiming that their parents are causing them serious harm by refusing to call them by a new name and pronouns?”
The Bill would criminalise a practice intended to change sexual orientation of a trans identity if it caused serious harm, or alarm or distress with a substantial adverse effect on the person’s day-to-day activities. The maximum five-year term applies on conviction on indictment. Courts could also make conversion practice protection orders; breaching one could carry up to two years in prison.
But the row is over what counts as “abusive” and who gets to decide. Writing in The Independent, Women and Equalities Minister Bridget Phillipson sought to reassure the public that “refusing to accept a child’s identity or use preferred pronouns” would not be criminalised.
An organiser of the Bin the Bill campaign disputed that assurance, telling TERF Times the legislation “is designed to force everyone accept that trans gender ideology is based in fact.” She warned that, with no age limit, “conversations around the kitchen table could criminalise any child over the age of responsibility as well as parents.”
The campaign also warned that the proposed law could undermine safeguarding guidance in schools, leaving teachers caught between following government rules and risking a five-year prison sentence.
The joint committee’s inquiry opened last week. On Thursday, 29th October, it will hear public evidence for the first time from supporters and critics of the Bill. Among the critics are Sex Matters’ director of advocacy Helen Joyce, Gay Men’s Network director Dennis Kavanagh and LGB Alliance vice-chair Dermot Kehoe. The committee must report by 22nd January 2027. After that, the Government will have to decide what to do with its recommendations.