Coach who tried to help a client overcome his ‘same sex attraction’ by using reparative therapy is struck off after undercover sting by homosexual reporter

Just before Coaching at Work went to press, Lesley Pilkington, a counsellor who agreed to ‘cure’ a gay ‘client’ of his homosexuality, lost her appeal to be reinstated by the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP), which upheld its ruling of last year that she was guilty of malpractice.
Pilkington was misled in 2009 by Patrick Strudwick, an undercover journalist and gay rights campaigner, who sought help overcoming his homosexuality.
Unknowingly recorded by Strudwick, Pilkington agreed to treat his ‘same sex attraction’ using a therapeutic approach known as reparative therapy. Strudwick subsequently reported her to the BACP.
Three years on (23 May), the BACP’s Professional Conduct Panel unanimously decided that Pilkington failed to provide Strudwick “with adequate professional services that could reasonably be expected of a practitioner exercising reasonable care and skill”.
The case and recent decision has stirred up the melting pot that is ethics in the helping professions. Also in the pot are religion (Pilkington is a Christian), sexuality (voices from both the pro-gay and anti-gay lobbies have come through loud and strong, with organisations including Christian Concern siding with Pilkington), and mental health.
Reparative, or conversion, therapy, which claims to be able to cure gays of their homosexuality, is highly controversial. In 2009, after spending two years evaluating 83 studies dating back to 1960, an American Psychological Association (APA) task force assembled to study reparative therapy’s effectiveness, concluded that there was scant evidence that sexual orientation could be changed and that attempting to do so could cause depression and suicidal tendencies. The APA voted to repudiate the therapy by125 to 4.
Professional bodies, including the BACP and the UK Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP), state clearly in their guidelines that it is an ethical offence to offer or conduct psychotherapy or psychotherapeutic counselling with the aim of altering ‘sexual orientation’.
In a statement following the BACP’s decision, the UKCP reiterated that it “does not consider homosexuality, or bisexuality, or transsexual and transgendered states to be pathologies, mental disorders or indicative of developmental arrest”.
Many of us will have strong views one way or the other about some of the issues in the melting pot. Whatever our views, what are the key issues and learnings for coaching and mentoring? Could we see a Pilkington case arise within our own profession? What do our own professional coaching bodies say in their codes of ethics?
Although the coaching bodies do not have clear guidelines around working on altering sexual orientation, there are a number of points in the various codes of ethics that relate to a case such as this.
In very general terms, the Association for Professional Executive Coaching and Supervision’s code states that coaches and coaching supervisors “will behave in ways which demonstrate: awareness of and sensitivity to difference (race, culture, gender, disability etc)”.
The Association for Coaching (AC)’s code states that coaches “must be sensitive to issues of culture, religion, gender, sexuality, disability and race and all other forms of equalities and diversity”.
More specifically, the International Coach Federation (ICF) and the European Mentoring & Coaching Council (EMCC), for example, are clear on the issue of conflict of interest. The ICF’s code of ethics (section 1, 4) states: “I will, at all times, strive to recognise personal issues that may impair, conflict, or interfere with my coaching performance or my professional coaching relationships.”
Section 2, 9 states: “I will seek to avoid conflicts of interest or potential conflicts of interest and openly disclose any such conflicts. I will offer to remove myself when such a conflict arises.”
And in the EMCC’s code of ethics, within the Boundary management section, it says: “Be aware of the potential for conflicts of interest of either a commercial or emotional nature to arise through the coach/mentoring relationship and deal with them quickly and effectively to ensure there is no detriment to the client or sponsor.”
Hilary Oliver, president of the UK ICF, said: “So if I’m a coach and I don’t believe in people being gay, I shouldn’t work with that [gay] person.
“There is a clear piece around not putting your beliefs onto the client… so if I believe a religious approach is right for me, (that doesn’t mean) I can indoctrinate someone to come to church.”
One issue is the extent to which we as practitioners follow our own or our client’s agenda: “I think it highlights the difference between coaching and counselling. In coaching, you’re clearly following the client’s agenda,” said Oliver.
This seems very clear-cut on the surface. However, in the literature, including in this magazine, we sometimes talk about serving a wider purpose – the environment, for example.
The ICF states clearly that coaches must not mislead their clients about what is possible. In section 3, it states: “I will not knowingly mislead or make false claims about what my client or sponsor will receive from the coaching process or from me as a coach” and “I will not give my prospective clients or sponsors information or advice I know or believe to be misleading or false.”
It’s unlikely that an executive coach would be called in to work on the goal presented by Strudwick at the outset, but personal coaches might.
Gladeana McMahon, chair, UK AC, said that one reason why coaches are unlikely to be faced with such a situation is that “coaching is not aimed at working at the psychological or emotional depth that therapeutic models are”.
However, she said: “In the unlikely event that this were to happen within a coaching context, the AC would treat such a situation as a gross misconduct by the individual coach concerned and take the appropriate action, including suspension, once a complaint had been fully investigated and upheld.”
We are here to serve our clients, and not our own agendas. We owe it to them to do our research and not make false claims for what we can achieve. We should also listen to any warning bells that alert us that we may be going off-piste.
Supervision with qualified coach supervisors, membership of professional bodies and paying close heed to codes of ethics, are the safety nets we have recourse to as coaches.

Volume 7, Issue 4