Ant and Dec urged to end partnership with TUI as PETA brands them 'misery ambassadors'

Ant McPartlin and Dec Donnelly person been urged to chopped ties with TUI, with carnal payment organisation PETA saying the question institution promotes 'marine abusement parks'

Animal payment organisation PETA has urged Ant McPartlin and Dec Donnelly to extremity their concern with question steadfast TUI implicit its promotion of "marine abusement parks".

Presenting duo Ant and Dec, some 48, person worked with TUI connected respective occasions, including done the now-rested ITV amusement Saturday Night Takeaway. Last year, the brace were announced arsenic the company's 'Happiness Ambassadors' for a societal media campaign, which has continued into this year.

Alongside offering assorted holidays, TUI promotes marine parks similar SeaWorld connected its website. There are respective branches of SeaWorld, astir notably its parkland successful Orlando, Florida, which arsenic good arsenic hosting rides, offers activities connected tract featuring assorted animals, including whales and dolphins.

PETA - known formally arsenic People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals - has sent Ant and Dec a missive with the petition to extremity their concern with TUI. The Mirror has exclusively obtained a transcript of the letter, dated September 20.

The letter, signed by PETA's elder campaigns manager Kate Werner, states: "I'm penning from [PETA] to impulse you to measurement down arsenic TUI's 'happiness ambassadors'. We anticipation that aft learning much astir the marine abusement parks TUI promotes, you’ll reconsider partnering with a institution that chases nett margins astatine the disbursal of carnal welfare.

"In your role, you're surely not ambassadors for the clever and playful cetaceans who are kept successful cramped tanks for quality amusement and endure greatly for their full lives. At SeaWorld, which TUI promotes, much than 40 orcas and implicit 500 different dolphins and whales person died. Severe trauma, intestinal gangrene, and cardiovascular nonaccomplishment are conscionable immoderate of the galore diseases these cetaceans exploited for amusement suffered from.

"In the wild, wherever they belong, orcas tin aquatics up to 150 miles a day. But astatine marine parks, they're imprisoned successful tanks of chemically treated h2o with nary accidental to enactment successful pods to find food, take their ain mate, oregon dive heavy done the water currents. Instead, they aquatics successful endless circles, interval listlessly, and gnaw connected the metallic bars of their factual tanks arsenic a effect of accent – sometimes until their teeth break."

It's further stated that "public absorption to this exploitation" has led to different question providers ending their promotion of venues that support cetaceans successful captivity. The missive concludes: "It's what consumers privation and what animals deserve, truthful we anticipation you'll halt being misery ambassadors and usage your power to impulse TUI to halt supporting this suffering - arsenic existent happiness comes from helping others."

Kate's besides said: "Ant and Dec take to beryllium entertainers, but highly intelligent dolphins and whales are forced to execute tricks astatine marine parks, wherever they're denied everything that's earthy and important to them."

SeaWorld, which has respective parks successful the US, has attracted overmuch disapproval implicit the years and successful 2016 that announced that it would beryllium ending its slayer whale breeding programme. A connection connected its website states: "In 2016, SeaWorld announced that we were ending our slayer whale breeding programme and that the orcas successful our attraction are the past procreation astatine our park. Our extremity is to animate and amended guests to instrumentality enactment by seeing these magnificent animals up-close to amended recognize wherefore protecting wildlife and our situation is truthful captious today." It besides states that each sojourn to SeaWorld "helps enactment carnal rescue efforts".

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