Latest updates: prominent campaigners furious that trans conversion therapy is being excluded from legislation
- Boris Johnson backtracks over LGBT conversion practices ban after backlash
- Third of British LGBTQ+ people experience abuse by relatives
Good morning. It is well known that Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s former chief adviser turned arch enemy, calls Johnson the “trolley” because he can’t keep going in the same direction for long. What is less well known is that the insult came from Johnson himself, who when trying to make up his mind about Brexit said he was “veering all over the place like a shopping trolley”. It is one of his more perceptive self-observations, and last night we witnessed a classic example, worthy of any trolley Olympics.
On the eve of the last election Boris Johnson agreed that a Conservative government would ban conversion therapy – a practice which involves trying to change someone’s sexuality or identity, which mostly happens in certain religious settings. Since then the government has consulted on the ban, but campaigners, and some news organisations, have flagged up claims that a ban could unintentionally criminalise clinicians and therapists helping people – particularly teenagers – dealing with gender dsysphoria.
