John,

For fourteen endless years, fifteen Gentoo penguins have been trapped in the basement of a London tourist attraction, cut off from sunlight, wind, and icy waters they were born to swim in.

In the wild, Gentoo penguins are the fastest swimming birds on Earth – sleek, powerful, and playful. Underground, they’re prisoners for profit, held captive inside SEA LIFE London’s windowless “ice world”, diving in a pool barely two metres deep and breathing recycled air instead of sea breeze.

But now, lawmakers are finally starting to take notice. An official motion has been introduced in the UK’s Parliament calling out this cruelty and with enough public pressure, we can seize this momentum to end the captivity once and for all!

We have to move fast – Parliament goes on recess soon so we’re at a critical moment to take the pressure to boiling point and push more lawmakers to back this penguin-saving motion before it’s too late.

Will you chip in now to fund a major campaign push to free the Gentoo penguins trapped beneath London – and defend all animals from exploitation?

I'll donate $3I'll donate $4 I'll donate $5I'll donate $9I'll donate another amount

SEA LIFE London isn’t a small independent aquarium. It’s part of Merlin Entertainments, one of the world’s biggest entertainment corporations, co-owned by Blackstone Group, the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), and Kirkbi, the private investment arm of the LEGO family.

While the penguins suffer, these companies profit – wrapping cruelty in “family-friendly fun” and calling it conservation. For too long, they’ve gotten away with it. But if enough of us chip in, we could change that by: 

• Ramping up lobbying to get MPs to back the parliamentary motion, flooding their inboxes, running targeted ads in key constituencies, and making it politically impossible to ignore this cruelty.

• Mobilizing Canadian citizens and pensioners to pressure the CPPIB with a clear message: our pensions should never fund animal cruelty 

• Launching a creative media campaign exposing LEGO’s family-friendly image to the suffering of real penguins kept underground by their business partner – reaching parents, fans, and the global LEGO community with one simple truth: cruelty is not child’s play.

Together, these tactics can turn outrage into unstoppable pressure, causing SEA LIFE London a global embarrassment until the penguins are freed. Thousands of us are already demanding that lawmakers force SEA LIFE to end this cruel exhibit – now we have to ramp up the pressure to take this campaign to the finish line.

Will you urgently chip in now to help give these penguins their first glimpse of the sky – and keep fighting against animal exploitation? 

I'll donate $3I'll donate $4 I'll donate $5I'll donate $9I'll donate another amount

Your donation will help power Ekō and our campaigns worldwide fighting for people and the planet.

When Ekō members learned about Mincho the dolphin trapped in a hotel tank in Mexico, our campaign helped shut down the facility and push for a national ban on marine mammal captivity. Now, the fifteen penguins trapped in SEA LIFE London’s basement need us to do it again. Let’s do it, together.