Deputy Premier Of Tasmania Opposes Greens Bill To End Conversion Practices

Deputy Premier of Tasmania’s Guy Barnett has opposed a Greens bill intending to end conversion practices in the state. In correspondence first revealed by ABC News, Barnett told Women Speak Tasmania that the bill was “fundamentally flawed”.

“Sadly, the draft Bill risks criminalising conversations and or prayers in a church or religious setting,” Barnett wrote, before asking “what exactly is the problem the Greens seek to fix?”

Equality Tasmania spokesperson Rodney Croome said the problem is very clear.

“This bill is about prohibiting treatments that don’t work for a condition that doesn’t exist undertaken by people who aren’t qualified on victims who will be deeply harmed,” Croome said.

“National and local studies, including research commissioned by Guy Barnett’s own government, show that 1 in 20 LGBTIQA+ Tasmanians are duped into conversion practices and that as a result they have PTSD and attempt suicide at 3 to 4 times the rate of other LGBTIQA+ people.”

“The problem the bill is trying to solve is that conversion practices purport to ‘heal’ vulnerable LGBTIQA+ people but actually deeply harm and sometimes kill them.”

The Greens’ “Extreme” Ban On Conversion Practices Has Already Worked In Other States

Mr Croome added the Tasmanian bill, which Barnett suggests is too extreme, is made up of elements nearly identical to what has been legislated elsewhere, with none of Barnett’s proposed problems ever coming to pass.

“The Tasmanian bill is made up of provisions from legislation in Victoria and NSW where no-one has been convicted for a conversation or a prayer, as Mr Barnett claims would happen in Tasmania. The sky hasn’t fallen in in the other states and it won’t fall in here either.

“Mr Barnett’s conversion bill, unveiled in 2023, had so many holes it would have encouraged conversion practices rather than ended them. His ill-informed attack on the key provisions of the current bill shows he isn’t serious about ending conversion practices and the harm they inflict.”

Both Mr Barnett and Women Speak Tasmania have called for a further inquiry before the bill is debated in parliament, despite an extensive consultation period, not to mention a comprehensive Tasmanian Law Reform Institute inquiry having been already released in 2022.

“There comes a point when further consultation is just about delaying what is an already overdue reform,” Croome said. “Tasmania risks being the last state to prohibit conversion practices just as we were the last state to decriminalise homosexuality.”