No bill against conversion therapy in Austria yet
The government of the Austrian Republic was not able to present a bill against conversion therapy. Photo EPA, Christian Bruna
Central Europe
The Austrian coalition government was not able to table a ban on conversion therapy on Wednesday. It had promised to send this bill to parliament, but the Conservatives and Greens in the government still could not agree.
According to Euractiv, the parliament had passed a unanimous resolution to ban conversion therapy in 2021. Conversion therapy is usually related to changing the sexual orientation of people. Especially the LGBT community experience this as an insult, since sexual orientation is seen as not changeable.
The government parties in Austria differ on whether the ban should extend to treatments for transgender individuals.
Insisted
The conservative ÖVP wanted to introduce a bill on Wednesday that would implement the 2021 resolution “one-to-one”. According to ÖVP MP Nico Marchetti, the Greens-minister of Justice, Alma Zadić, rejected this and “insisted on things that go beyond the unanimous agreement of parliament.”
According to the Green Party, the situation is not as straightforward. The ÖVP has already had a draft on the table since October 2022, which included provisions for banning conversion therapies targeting transgender individuals, Zadić stressed.
Criticism also came from the opposition.
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