29 October, Luke Pollard MP was calling on Plymouth’s LGBT+ Community to contribute to a new government consultation to ban LGBT conversion therapy.
The consultation, launched by the government today [29 October], is seeking responses on how to ban conversion therapy. It could include making conversion therapy a criminal offence and banning the promotion of the practice.
Luke has long campaigned for the end of gay conversion therapy, which he sees as a cruel and unjust practice. He has been calling on Ministers to change the law on behalf of LGBT+ people in Plymouth who have suffered because of this practice.
Luke Pollard said:
“I want to see a complete and total ban on LGBT conversion therapy. There cannot be any loopholes allowed that may allow this horrible and cruel practice to continue.
“I’m proud to be Plymouth’s first openly gay MP. I believe strongly that love is love and everyone should be free to be themselves. I want everyone in our city to achieve their full potential but that is harder to achieve when people are being attacked for being themselves.
“These proposals are a first step, but I worry that Ministers may be considering adding loopholes to the ban -that’s why I’m calling on Plymouth’s LGBT community to respond to this consultation and end this homophobic practice for good.”
Luke Pollard is Plymouth’s first openly LGBT+ MP. He has campaigned on consistently on LGBT+ issues in the past, such as lifting the ban on gay men giving blood, and for a memorial for Terry Sweet – who was murdered in a homophobic attack in Plymouth.