'Relitigating' conversion practices is an anti-trans dogwhistle

I wrote this post for 1/200 because it's pretty clear to me that our media outlets aren't prepared to challenge the kind of disinformation Peters spouts on the regular - I guess newsworthiness (read: ad revenue) overrides all. I think these issues of disinformation and truth are at the heart of the challenges that face all of us. If you aren't already reading or listening to 1/200, go check them out.

In 2022, an overwhelming majority of MPs in the New Zealand Government voted to prohibit conversion practices - that is, practices that aim to change or suppress someone’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. The legislation was hard-won, and fought for by thousands and thousands - 106,700 submissions, the record at the time, with around 70% in favour. It made headlines around the world, passing with 112 votes for and only 8 against.

Never one to be stopped by the unpopularity of his party and his policies, this week New Zealand First leader Winston Peters declared he’d like to take another look at the lauded conversion practices ban, alongside criminalising abortion and ignoring court rulings about access to gender affirming healthcare. He did this in conversation with Bob McCoskrie of Family First, who has been incredibly active in his opposition of all three of those issues.

This is part of a broader campaign of culture war issues New Zealand First is importing to our shores, and I think it’s important to be specific about the intended target here - and it seems pretty clear to me that the target is once again trans people.

One of the ‘concerns’ raised by McCoskrie and echoed by certain members of the house at the time was the notion that the act criminalises parents from having discussions with their children about gender. McCoskrie framed it as “parents [being] criminalised for affirming that their sons are boys and their daughters are girls.”

(He goes on to warn that the act would criminalise “parents who wish to protect their child from the physical, emotional, and psychological harm caused by gender dysphoria” and boy, do I have great news for him about a model of care that protects against exactly those harms!)

Judith Collins, the National Party leader at the time of the second reading, resolutely stood her party against the bill, saying “I will not support parents being criminalised for being parents.”

This, of course, was nonsense, and still is. Dr Eddie Clark wrote at the time that the wording of the bill makes it clear there must be an intentional act towards a person for it to be considered a conversion practice, not just a lack of action (for example, refusing to seek affirming health care for a trans child). Labour gave the following quote to NPR:

"This new legislation isn't about criminalising open and respectful conversations about sexuality and gender," they wrote. "It's been carefully designed to make sure that general expressions of religious beliefs or principles — as well as health practitioners or other people providing legitimate care and advice — won't be penalised."

This gives an answer to why McCoskrie and co are so worried: not once have they been capable of having “open and respectful conversations” about gender. Even in his post warning about the dangers of the bill, a public-facing document where he is surely moderating his beliefs to some extent, the example he gives is “affirming that their sons are sons” - that is, resolutely denying the identity of a trans child.

And to be clear, even that denial isn’t caught by the legislation in and of itself - nor should it. What is caught are attempts by family members to suppress or change their child’s gender.

In Peters’ interview with McCoskrie, the conversion practices ban is brought up directly in relation to transgender children. Peters specifies exactly why he opposes the legislation: “ever since the beginning of humanity there has only been two variants, male and female”. He’s wrong, but his target is clear.

Peters is now trying to walk this back, blaming the media for "misdescribing" his statement. Perhaps he's realised the vast unpopularity of his position: back of the napkin math indicates that the number of people who took the move to submit in support of the bill equates to about 50% of New Zealand First's vote share in the 2023 election.

In the statement he repeats the "criminalising parents" disinformation and says New Zealand First is "open to reviewing it, which could mean improvement. It does not mean repealing it" - very different to how he speaks to his own audience:

McCoskrie: Is [sic] there moves to overturn or relitigate the conversion therapy [sic] law?

Peters: Well, I sure hope so. But you see, we came into a circumstance where we inherited that. There's no doubt in my mind if we had been there at the time that that would not pass through. Well, we have made a pretty strong fight against that because the plain fact is that uh um ever since the beginning of humanity has been only two variants, male and female. It's breathtaking. You've got former prime ministers who can't even tell you what a female is. This is how bad it is.

England and Wales are currently navigating the introduction of legislation that would prohibit conversion practices and it’s helpful for us to look at the discussions that are being had over there. Trans people are, of course, raising concerns about the systematic subjection of trans people to state-mandated conversion practices in the NHS.

At the 2025 AusPATH conference, which took place in Tasmania just days after New Zealand’s Minister of Health Simeon Brown attempted to introduce a ban on transgender children accessing reversible pubertal suppression, trans health researcher Cal Horton gave a keynote about the reality for transgender children in the United Kingdom. They described the way that “mandated psychoeducation” was now formally included in the pathway for transgender kids to sit on a waiting list to not get care, while their parents were taught - by the NHS - how to perform conversion practices on their children.

Across all the discourse opposing gender affirming healthcare in the United Kingdom, there’s a uniting unspoken value: that being transgender is an unacceptable or lesser outcome for a young person. It’s implicit across the Cass Review and every step the United Kingdom has taken to “make sure” this care is right for trans kids. It’s why they aren’t just limiting their campaign to medical interventions - it’s why the NHS’ standards for their new child and youth gender service talk about social transition (aka children getting to play with haircuts and clothes!) as if it were a risky medication, requiring doctors to “discuss the risks and benefits” with families.

It’s also why the Cass Review recommended that families making decisions about social transition (again, clothes and haircuts) be seen “as early as possible by a clinical professional” - she’s explicit in saying “sex of rearing seems to have some influence on gender outcome” and that “avoiding premature decisions and considering partial rather than full transition can be a way of ensuring flexibility and keeping options open”, just in case the child in question can be convinced to remain in their sex assigned at birth after all.

God forbid they book their child a haircut without clinical oversight! If I were a parent seeing this amount of government intervention in how I choose to raise my child, I’d be giving McCoskrie a call.

In responding to the Council of Europe voting through a ban on conversion practices at the start of this year, before the UK had introduced theirs, Horton outlined the five areas they witness conversion practices occurring in the UK:

“1: Our NHS children’s gender clinics, in ways that align with UK Government policy.

2: Other NHS healthcare professionals who are practicing overt conversion practices, in ways that align with UK Government policy.

3: Parents, conducting conversion practices on their own children, many of whom are acting in ways that align with UK Government policy.

4: UK Schools, conducting conversive practices on children in their care, in ways that align with UK Government policy.

5: Private therapists, conducting very explicitly conversive therapy.”

The text of the draft ban includes a carve-out for healthcare that would allow continued conversive practices in the NHS - all it takes is for conversion practices to be the norm in a healthcare system, and the legislation would consider it legal:

(3) Conduct which—

(a) is carried out by a person towards an individual with such an intention, but(b) is carried out in the course of providing health care services to the individual concerned,

is not a conversion practice unless the person acts in a way that falls far below the standards reasonably expected of a person in their position.

In the meantime, “gender critical” activists are causing the exact same fuss that McCoskrie did in 2021 - the proposed ban threatens the rights of women and parents, it undermines parents, it’s the ruination of the family unit, it’ll stop hundreds of therapists working with trans people, on and on and on. The text of the ban allows ongoing systematic subjection of transgender young people to conversive practices and still they oppose it, because there can be no suggestion in law that being transgender is an acceptable outcome.

New Zealand First have spent the last three years importing anti-transgender legislation from the United Kingdom. They fought for the attempted puberty blocker ban, crowing about it even before the Minister of Health had made the announcement. They introduced Jenny Marcroft’s ‘definition of woman and man’ bill. Cis women are copping it from them now, too, with Peters platforming the "full term" anti-abortion disinformation from McCoskrie and his own candidates, and Marcroft's definition bill (inadvertently? Maybe not) restricting access to reproductive healthcare for those under 18 by excluding them from her definition of "woman".

Horton has since left the UK, writing a lengthy piece that lays bare the reality for trans kids and their families there. You should read it. Put yourself in the shoes of a parent having to consider leaving the place you call home, because your government is making life impossible for your child. Think about the worry, the exhaustion, the fear, the grief. We fight here in Aotearoa to keep our kids safe from these harms, and to do our part to show sense to the rest of the world.

Every year we have been hit by challenge after challenge, set-back after set-back, threat after threat, arriving at least monthly for years. Every set-back reduces our family’s space to live with equality, dignity and hope. Every set-back, every roll back on our family’s rights takes an immense mental health toll. Every time it gets harder to bounce back, to regroup, to regain hope for the future. The toll has been really heavy – it weighs on me – it weighs on our daughter. She shouldn’t have to live under this constant psychological strain. None of us should.  

The UK is not a safe location for a trans child.

Transgender people have been warning for the last 10 years that we are being used as the thin edge of the wedge to roll back progress more broadly - certainly there are some in the anti-trans movement, like McCoskrie, who would be thrilled to roll back protections for cisgender queer people, too. Defending those protections for all of us requires us to understand and name the means that movement is using to attack us.

This rhetoric all serves one goal: we should be allowed to openly deny the existence of transgender people in public life. That’s what Winston Peters means when he says he’d like to “relitigate” this ban. New Zealand First are acting as part of a broader anti-transgender campaign, in collaboration with international anti-trans networks, and it’s critical that we recognise that for what it is and understand the context it is happening in.