In December 2025, the Committee on Equality and Non-Discrimination of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) unanimously adopted a draft resolution calling for a Europe-wide ban on so-called “conversion practices” — defined as any attempt to change, repress or suppress a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.
The resolution, tabled by Kate Osborne, a UK Labour MP and member of the Socialists, Democrats and Greens Group, will be voted on in the PACE plenary. It is crucial that this vote is met with informed scrutiny and democratic engagement.
While the resolution is presented as a human rights measure, it deliberately conflates sexual orientation with gender identity and gender expression — concepts that are fundamentally different and, in many ways, incompatible. Gender identity is an ideological belief system that denies biological reality and insists that children can be “born in the wrong body.”
The draft resolution proposes:
- Criminal sanctions and national legislation targeting mental health professionals, educators, parents and social workers who do not affirm a child’s declared gender identity or gender expression;
- Mandatory training and public awareness campaigns across healthcare, education, social services, religious institutions, law enforcement, the judiciary and prosecutors;
- A state-enforced belief system with wide-ranging effects on professional standards, parental rights and children’s access to exploratory, evidence-based care.
This sweeping overreach must be stopped.
PACE delegates from your country will soon vote on this resolution. We are calling on citizens across Europe to write to their national delegates — particularly to heads of national delegations and leaders of the political groups within PACE — and urge them to vote NO on the resolution in its current form.
We’ve prepared a briefing on the transactivist push to extend conversion therapy bans to gender identity and gender expression, as well as a template letter you can send to delegates.
👉 Write to your PACE delegate: join our campaign here
👉 Read and share our briefing on the new conversion therapy bans
This is a crucial moment for the protection of children, the rights of lesbian and gay youth and democratic accountability. Make your voice heard!