A private member’s bill by Chatham-Kent-Leamington MPP Rick Nicholls to repeal Ontario’s pit bull ban has passed second reading, but there’s still a long way to go before it becomes law.

Nicholls knows this is an emotional issue for many people, noting there’s strong support on both sides of the debate.

In fact, all 12 votes against the bill – which passed second reading on Nov. 21 at Queen’s Park – were cast by the MPPs own Progressive Conservative caucus members.

“I had no problem with some of my colleagues voting against my bill,” Nicholls said, adding it was free vote.

But he said many humane societies support the bill, as the Ontario Veterinary Medical Association.

But the bill is not law yet, said Nicholls, noting it still has to go through committee, which includes getting input from the public.

“We might even have to travel around … to get input, can we make this bill stronger,” he added.

“I’m open to hear suggestions from people,” Nicholls said.

He said the bill has been assigned to general government committee and anticipates there will be revisions made to make it even stronger.

“The purpose of this bill is to emphasize breed-neutral legislation,” he added. “You cannot put breed-specific legislation on every breed of dog.”

Nicholls said there’s a lot of misconceptions about pit bulls, adding data was collected from public boards of health across Ontario for 2018, which shows “out of 1,429 reported dog bites, 13 were from pit bulls.”

He added there are studies that show viciousness is not in the DNA of pit bulls.

“I don’t believe it’s in any dog’s DNA,” Nicholls said, pointing the blame at how many are trained.

“Pit bulls seemed to be aligned with illegal activity,” he said, citing dog-fighting rings or gangs that train the dogs to attack as examples.

He said understands how traumatic it is to be bitten by dog.

“But, there’s a lot of misinformation out there,” Nicholls said.

He said his bill addresses the situation that if there is a vicious attack by a dog that results in serious injury or death to a person, then the courts can have the dog destroyed and the owner could face a steep fine and even imprisonment.

His private member’s bill targets the Dog Owners Liability Act brought in by the Liberal government in March 2005 after a number of high-profile attacks by pit bulls.

Calling the Liberal pit bull ban a knee-jerk reaction, Nicholls said, “Don’t blame the dog, blame the owner. I say the legislation went after the wrong end of the leash.”