Mr. Speaker, the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands and I both represent regions of the Salish Sea, both very much informed by our constituents. They talk about the need to protect whales, to take our responsibility as citizens, now that we know the impacts on these highly social species. It is important for them to be able to dive deeply, to be able to communicate with each other. We know the social and feeding needs of the species. It is increasingly abhorrent to have them in captivity.
When my two nieces, Rachel and Breanna, were very young, the cool thing to do was have a birthday party at the aquarium. Now they and their friends say, “no way”, that this would be the worst birthday party they could ever go to. They are much more interested in going to aquariums, the kind of Ripley's Believe It or Not. As a result, the stocks of Sea World and so on have dropped as the appetite has left.
I am curious about my fellow parliamentarian's sense of the public support she has had for the eventual phase-out of keeping whales in captivity.