‘The Prime Minister will come to rue the day he decided to choose silence over action’

Silence is a powerful weapon.

It speaks volumes, deafening those it impacts. Sadly, these are almost always the most vulnerable and marginalised in our society, whilst those with the power to protect them look on indifferently.

Silence always gives a resounding endorsement to the status quo, emboldening perpetrators to continue their abuse unchecked. It is the ultimate form of moral cowardice, which this government has shown in spades in relation to protecting LGBT+ people. The proof? Just look at the total communications blackout regarding the long-promised legislation to ban barbaric practices known as ‘conversion therapy’.

“Banning conversion practices was their headline soundbite”

To be fair, this “silence strategy” is nothing new. The government has used it as its default mechanism for most of the last five years whilst supposedly delivering its flagship promise to the LGBT+ community. Banning conversion practices was their headline soundbite, which they trumpeted loudly when they launched their LGBT+ Action Plan in July 2018. However, they have been rowing back on this ever since. 

First, we had months of silence regarding the publication of the report into their own specially commissioned research into these degrading practices, which clearly showed just how harmful conversion practices are. Then we had months of silence regarding requests to meet with survivors, more recently we have had silence regarding the publication of its (extended) consultation results and now we have silence over their delay in publishing draft legislation, which was announced in two Queen’s speeches.

What’s so ironic is that this legislation is known to be a clear vote winner with a large majority of the general public, most of whom are horrified to learn that attempts to change, “cure” or suppress a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity are still legal in the UK. It makes no sense, especially given all the research that proves just how much damage this causes, particularly to young LGBT+ children.

One has to ask, who they think they are fooling?

“We LGBT+ people are seen as expendable collateral when it comes to their ultimate prize, trying to stay in power”

For we all know that tragically they do not really want to protect LGBT+ people. Of course, there have been a handful of LGBT+ friendly Tories who have valiantly tried to keep this on the government’s agenda, but they too have been played by an administration that has lurched so far to the right that it makes even Mrs. Thatcher look like a moderate. Ever since we learnt that Liz Truss had unilaterally decided to drop the LGBT+ Action Plan, closely followed by the leak that Boris Johnson had wanted to drop the entire ‘conversion therapy’ legislation, we knew that this was going to be an uphill struggle with the Tories.

But why all this difficulty? The answer is even more ironic – it is because they care about votes. But in this case, they only care about the votes of their far-right voters, many of whom are right-wing religious folk who want to continue to “pray the gay away” (a euphemism for religious ‘conversion therapy’, where people are subjected, as I was, to hours of exorcisms and prayer ministry). It is a sad but true fact that we LGBT+ people are seen as expendable collateral when it comes to their ultimate prize, trying to stay in power.

I know that there are desperate attempts by several Tory MPs behind the scenes to try and salvage something of their tattered reputation with the LGBT+ community, but I for one have made it very clear we will not accept breadcrumbs. We want a government that gets just how harmful these practices are, which prioritises banning them, and stands by us against those who seek to harm and abuse us.

“The Prime Minister will come to rue the day he decided to choose silence over action”

However, when you have a Prime Minister who thinks it is totally acceptable to use his privilege to spout division and hate, as he did at his own Party Conference earlier this month, you know that there is little hope of him understanding the importance of protecting the most vulnerable in his care.

Here is a man who says he wants to make long-term decisions, and yet does nothing to bring our country in line with the international norms recommended by the UN in relation to protecting LGBT+ people, which has now been implemented by dozens of other countries around the world. 

Here is a man who says he does not like banning things, and yet is quite happy to impose – without any mandate from the general public – a radical smoking ban on young people. 

And here is a man who says he is keen to make unpopular decisions, and yet grinned widely at the loud cheer he received from this far-right voters when he uttered his dog whistle trope against trans people.

The British people will be slow to forgive how anti-LGBT this administration has become.  Whilst No. 10 may think that we are a small minority of voters, they are likely to find out the hard way that gay and lesbian people have friends, families, neighbours, and work colleagues who will stand with us when it comes to protecting us. They ignore us at their peril, for our lives are now of mainstream concern to many.

Mark my words, the Prime Minister will come to rue the day he decided to choose silence over action, a decision we must never ever let him nor his party forget.

Jayne Ozanne is the Chair of the Ban Conversion Therapy Coalition and is a former member of the government’s LGBT+ advisory panel.