Watch: Amanda Holden In Live TV Animal Rights Argument With Lion Tamer
Phillip Schofield steps in after his co-host has a war of words with a guest who works professionally with big cats.
Amanda Holden couldn’t hold back from engaging in a row with a guest on This Morning, when Thomas Chipperfield defended his family’s work touring with lions.
Chipperfield appeared on the ITV daytime show following the news that lion tamers are facing extinction because of animal rights campaigners and was speaking from inside a cage with a lion during the broadcast.
The debate happened after the lion roared at Chipperfield during a demonstration and ran away.
The lion tamer was quizzed by Schofield and Holden about whether he believed his treatment of big cats was fair.
“Why do you do this? Why is it not free or in a zoo?” asked Schofield.
Chipperfield replied: “I do it because I love working with these animals. They have their off days, like we all do.”
Holden, a passionate animal rights activist who has worked with the Born Free Foundation, refused to accept her guest’s answer.
“The argument is that they shouldn’t be kept in an enclosure… wild animals are always going to be wild,” she said.
“If you were kept in a cage for days on end, you’d be feeling very claustrophobic and like a prisoner.”
Chipperfield angrily refuted Holden’s suggestions claiming that there was evidence circus animals “suffer less physical and emotional stress than any other environment in captivity” and added that “animals don’t see the world like we do.”
He went one step further, branding Holden a hypocrite for working with trained animals on her TV drama Wild At Heart.
A visibly annoyed Holden hit back: “Well hardly! As they were rescued animals saved from people like you.”
Chipperfield wouldn’t relent, claiming that he knew the trainer involved in the TV show and repeated that Holden was in the wrong.
At this point, Schofield stepped into the row to avoid the issue becoming “personal”.
Holden obviously felt like she had gone too far with her comments, adding later: “Sorry, I know I should just keep my mouth shut sometimes.”