This document contains links to the relevant government documents, summaries and analysis of the Bill and related documents and advice about writing to and appearing at a Select Committee.

The basics: where to write and by when

Public submissions are now being called for Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill. The closing date for submissions is Wednesday, 08 September 2021 and you can make a submission directly from this link (at the bottom of the page) or you can email the Select Committee directly. The email address is
ju@parliament.govt.nz and you can phone them for advice on : 0064 4 817 9520. Here is my advice about working with Select Committees including how to make private and anonymous submissions.

New Zealand’s affirmative approach to gender medicine almost ensures that increasing numbers of vulnerable children will end up infertile and as lifelong medical patients if this bill is passed. But many people opposed to the bill (especially the provisions related to children) may not be willing or able to make a public submission

You are welcome to use any of this as inspiration for your own submission.

An open letter to Dr. Ayesha Verrall ahead of the Select Committee hearings
Possible topics for a submission
Analysis of the Regulatory Impact Assessment and the lack of alignment with the NZ Bill of Rights

Government resources to support a submission

The draft bill bill is an omnibus bill to prohibit conversion practices that seek to change or suppress a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression.

Hansard debate on the first reading of the Bill

The digest to the Bill notes that it causes a significant limitation on freedom of expression, but that in the opinion of Crown Law this limitation is warranted.

Regulatory Impact Assessment

Crown Law analysis of whether there is compliance with the Bill of Rights Act

Important points

While adults can make their own decisions, children who have gender issues are very likely to change their minds as they mature. The best research shows that 87% desist from cross sex beliefs. They are also very likely to see being trans as a way of avoiding intolerable things in their present – like avoiding sexual or other abuse, feeling wrong, having no role models of men or women who present outside of the usual gender stereo-types, experiencing on-line grooming or having feelings of same sex attraction. For girls and young women facing sexual threats and violence, unwanted touching or outright misogyny are reported as issues . These things should be able to be addressed through counselling.The end point of an identification of gender identity is most often medication that will be lifelong and surgery. The reasons why children imagine they are the opposite sex have little to do with a felt experience but much more to do with adatation to mental distress as Keira Bell in the UK explains.

The Ministry of Health advised against a bill to criminalise conversion therapy.
There is little evidence that it is a problem and no information has been collected or held by government.
Most people who signed a petition that brought the legislation into being signed to prevent gay conversion therapy not to prevent counselling to address why children believe themselves to be in the wrong body.

For these kinds of reasons the previous Select Committee advised that counselling needed to be defined and that different arrangements needed to be in place for children in any future legislation. The Ministry of Justice has ignored this advice. Instead converstion practices has been defined in such a broad and non-specific way (causing harm or serious harm) that it is likely that it will prevent health practitioners and others from addressing the root causes of gender confusion in children. (It is as well to remember that in relation to gender ideology activists the bar to “serious harm” is very low. You may recall that the Speak Up For Women event was cancelled because it would cause serious mental anguish and serious harm even though the event was to take place after lecture hours during a term holiday).

New Zealand’s Gender medicine regime is highly controversial and its practices are extreme. It has been reported that 2/3 of all the children with gender issues who are on the books in one youth clinic are who are on puberty blockers. In contrast in the UK and Australia the figure is closer to 5% of patients and much greater caution is applied before they are used. In NZ advice to doctors is that they are, and should be, used very freely. Some parents have reported that their children have been offered the medicine early in the first consultation. It has even been offered in consultations about other health matters.