Inside the Low Welfare Act Coalition’s Parliamentary Event on Ending Cruel Animal Tourism
On 4 March 2026, we co-organised a Parliamentary event with other animal protection groups to urge MPs to ensure that the Animals (Low Welfare Activities Abroad) 2023 Act is implemented.
The Act – which would crack down on travel companies promoting and selling tickets to cruel facilities like SeaWorld and ‘tiger temples’, and activities like elephant rides – received Royal Assent in 2023, but it has sat idle since then without any regulations that would define which specific activities it covers. In December 2025, the government published its animal welfare strategy, stating that it is considering legislative and non-legislative options for this issue, suggesting the Act may never be implemented.
Confined, Exploited, Killed
Around the world, animals are drugged, beaten and tormented in marine abusement parks and other tourist traps, where they are forced to perform unnatural tricks, give rides in the blistering heat, or are used as photo props or objects of ridicule. The UK government has acknowledged that this suffering is unacceptable and that the UK must not be complicit in such cruelty. That’s why it passed the Low Welfare Activities Abroad Act in the first place. Yet the whole process is now being made a mockery of by ignoring the Act and allowing the suffering to continue with the UK’s backing.
The Government Must Act
Because the government has failed to publish any guidance on which activities the Act applies to, this important piece of legislation has, for all intents and purposes, been useless since its introduction.
How to Help Animals Abused Abroad
While we work with MPs and other groups to push for this law to be implemented, you can help animals suffering abroad by only booking with travel companies that do not support cruel animal activities.
TUI is the only large travel company that still sells tickets to SeaWorld and other marine abusement parks. We are calling on it to stop supporting orca abuse. Find out how you can take action:
Help Animals in 2026: Renew Your PETA Membership!
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