EU Commission commits to act on "conversion practices" after years of pressure

For years, All Out members have been pushing the European Union to take a clear stand against so-called "conversion therapy" – practices that try to change, suppress, or repress a person's sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. On 13 May 2026, the European Commission formally responded. It will issue a recommendation in 2027 calling on every EU country to ban these practices in national law, and has named conversion practices as a priority in its new LGBT+ Equality Strategy.

This is a meaningful step forward. It is also not the full binding EU ban that more than one million Europeans had demanded. The work is not done – but the ground has shifted.

The campaign to end "conversion practices" in Europe has been a long one. All Out launched its petition urging the European Commission to act years before the issue reached the EU institutions at this level. More than 64,000 All Out members signed on. When the European Citizens' Initiative "Ban on conversion practices in the European Union" launched in 2024, All Out mobilised its community a second time, asking petition signers to also sign the official initiative on the European Commission's platform. The citizens' initiative is one of the strongest democratic tools available to people in the EU. Crossing the one-million signature threshold legally obliged the Commission to respond.

The scale of the harm is well documented. "Conversion practices" have no therapeutic value and have been condemned by the World Health Organization, leading medical and psychiatric associations, and the United Nations, which has concluded they can amount to torture under international law. According to the 2023 LGBT+ survey by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, one in four LGBT+ people in the EU have been subjected to conversion practices. The figure rises to nearly half – 47 percent of trans women and 48 percent of trans men. These are not historical numbers. They describe what is happening across Europe right now.

That is what makes the Commission's response significant. For the first time, the European Commission has committed to deliver a formal instrument calling on all 27 Member States to ban "conversion practices" in their national legal systems. The recommendation will draw on the laws already in place in eight EU countries – Belgium, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Malta, Portugal, and Spain – and will include complementary measures such as training for medical practitioners and support for victims. Member States will be invited to report on how they implement it.

The Commission has also announced a new LGBT+ policy forum that will meet for the first time in Brussels before the end of 2026, with "conversion practices" as its opening focus. A Commission-commissioned study on conversion practices is already underway and will inform the recommendation.

The Commission stopped short of what the citizens' initiative had asked for. It declined to propose binding EU legislation, arguing that every binding route through the Treaties would require unanimous agreement from all 27 governments – a threshold that has blocked LGBT+ rights legislation in the Council for years.

The fight now moves where the next decisions will be made: in national capitals. Many EU countries still have no specific legal protection against "conversion practices." Whether the Commission's 2027 recommendation translates into real protection for LGBT+ people on the ground depends on what governments choose to do with it.

The progress made so far did not happen on its own. It is the result of years of sustained pressure from LGBT+ communities, families, allies, medical professionals, and human rights advocates across Europe. The All Out community was part of that pressure, twice over – first through our own petition, then by helping mobilise signatures for the European Citizens' Initiative. So were the organizers of the citizens' initiative, the European Parliament, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and the European Economic and Social Committee, all of which have called for action on conversion practices over the past year.

The Commission's recommendation is a step, not a finish line. The next phase of this fight will play out in 19 capitals, in legislatures, courts, medical associations, and communities. The same determination that brought the EU institutions to this point will be needed to make sure every LGBT+ person in Europe is protected, not just those who happen to live in the right country.

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