Criminalising prayer and parenting?
Conversion therapy update
Public concern about a planned new law on ‘conversion therapy’ continues to grow. Much of the opposition stems from the serious lack of clarity about what is to be outlawed.
This £20,000 is in addition to £187,500 which was used by the Foundation to fund its two GIC+ conferences.
An LGBT lobby group which opposes the findings of the landmark Cass Review into NHS gender services in England was promised almost £1 million in taxpayer funds by the Foreign Office.
The Ozanne Foundation has already received sums of £137,500 and £50,000 for two conferences titled the Global Interfaith Commission on LGBT+ Lives (GIC+). These sought to promote LGBT ideology in faith settings and advocate for a new law against so-called conversion therapy. The larger conference was attended in person by just 80 activists.
The Foundation claims the Foreign Office “agreed in principle” to provide a further £805,000 to fund a future project to launch a course to teach religious leaders acceptance of LGBT issues. That sum is understood to be currently under review.
Anti-Cass
The Foundation’s Director, former Church of England General Synod member Jayne Ozanne, has publicly criticised the findings of the Cass Review, which concluded that giving trans drugs to children is based on “remarkably weak evidence”.
Dr Hilary Cass urged NHS England to review its use of puberty blocking drugs and cross-sex hormones and ensure that gender-confused children receive a ‘holistic assessment’ of all their needs. The NHS has since said that it will launch an evidence review and public consultation on cross-sex hormones for young people, and is set to define sex as “biological sex” when its constitution is updated.
However, Ozanne has opposed the report, sharing a post on X (formerly Twitter) from the GenderGP service, run by disgraced GP Helen Webberley, which claimed that “children and young people will suffer and die if these recommendations are implemented”.
She also tried to discredit the review, saying: “Dr Cass has taken only a limited number of reports as evidence and ignored a lot from the international community”.
‘Hate prayers’
Ozanne is a prominent advocate of banning so-called conversion therapy, including “gentle, non-coercive prayer” that does not affirm a person’s LGBT sexual orientation or gender identity.
In 2020, she likened churches and Christians that uphold the Bible’s teaching on sexual ethics to ‘Holocaust deniers’ and ‘rapists’.
She has also claimed it is “evangelicals and Catholics and charismatics and those who believe that it is wrong to be LGBT who want to continue to pray for people to be either healed or changed or suppressed, and that is harmful”. She said such prayers are “torture” and could be described as “hate prayer”.
‘Value for money’
Lord Jackson of Peterborough asked the Foreign Office why it agreed to give such substantial funds to the lobby group.
He called for clarity on how much funding has already been disbursed to the Ozanne Foundation, on what evidential basis was that funding released, and what conditions were attached.
He also asked what future funds have been allocated to the Foundation, if any due diligence took place before they were agreed, and what steps the Government is taking “to measure value for money in respect of funding disbursed or provisionally allocated to the Ozanne Foundation”.
The Foreign Office has until 17 May to respond.
Jayne Ozanne: ‘Repentance unnecessary for salvation’
Criminalising prayer and parenting?
Top KC says Lib Dem ‘conversion therapy’ Bill threatens fundamental freedoms