The New Zealand Parliament has approved a law that prohibits conversion therapies, which seek to forcibly change the orientation, expression or sexual identity of members of the LGTBIQ community, and that contemplates penalties for those responsible of up to five years in prison .
The bill, which was one of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s electoral promises, was approved last night by 112 votes in favor and eight against.
This put an end to “a hurtful, insidious and destructive mistake,” Deputy Prime Minister Grant Roberston said before the third vote, according to statements collected by Radio New Zealand.
The Labor politician, who has publicly declared his homosexuality, considered that the approval of the law “sends a message: a message of support and affirmation of love to all the communities of the rainbow.”
The law contemplates a sentence of up to three years in prison if this type of therapy is applied to a person under 18 years of age or incapacitated to make decisions, as well as a sentence of five years in the event that the conversion therapy causes a serious harm to the person, whatever his age.
The legislation also opens a way for victims to claim compensation in civil courts for having undergone conversion therapy.
According to a study conducted by the University of Waitako in New Zealand in 2018, one in six transsexual or non-binary people said that a psychologist or religious counselor tried to change their sexual identity.
In the neighboring country of Australia, requests are growing for sexual conversion therapies – which the UN considers to be a form of torture against the LGTBIQ community – to be prohibited throughout the country, after the state of Queensland, the Territory of the Australian Capital and Victoria will make them illegal from 2020. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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