A dog-lover has issued a heartfelt plea for people to sign a petition and write to their MP in a bid to overturn the upcoming ban on a dangerous dog.

Rhiannon Wright was pictured at the recent Monmouthshire Show with Henry, her rescue dog who was found collapsed on the side of the road, half the size he is now and had clearly been beaten, his ears had been cropped and his tail docked.

Rhiannon, a volunteer with the dog charity Hope Rescue, then fostered the dog herself once he had recovered.

But now she faces the prospect of an uncertain future for Henry as he looks like an XL Bully dog: the breed that has recently been the focus of legislation to place them on the list of dangerous dogs.

She said: “I am absolutely heartbroken at the government’s decision to ban XL Bully dogs, this is not the answer, we know that.”

She explained that the Dangerous dogs Act 1991 “didn’t stop dog attacks happening, it hasn’t stopped backyard breeders finding the latest fashionable dog to sell to unscrupulous people who like to give that image of a hard person which essentially leads to these dogs being brought up in terrible, terrible conditions that is leading to the problems that we have been facing and the govt knee-jerk reaction is total and utter rubbish.”

Although she doesn’t know yet if Henry will fall under the XL bully category, but because he’s a rescue, no-one can ever say for certain what breed he is, “but we have always believed him to be an American Bulldog crossbreed,” she added.

She said that adding a breed to the list of dangerous dogs as defined in the Dangerous Dogs Act of 1991 is not the answer, “ its never going to be the answer. In two or three years time we are going to be in the same situation with a different breed of dog”.

She says that the only thing that is going to happen here is that innocent dogs are going to be “ripped away from their families based on the way they look”.

Having worked at a vet’s practice for two years, Rhiannon said “there is no definition of an XL Bully breed at the moment so it is going to come down to how your dog looks and how it measures up to a tape measure and that along with rule about your dog being breed specific aggression.

“It doesn’t matter if your dog is an American bulldog or what breed you say your dog is or what breed your vet says it is.

“I have worked in practice for two years and I can tell you now it is not breed specific, there are so many things that can lead to dog aggression and I would say that in 95 per cent of the situations it is down to the owner, to the breeder, it is down to the humans that are behind this,” she said tearfully in a plea on social media.

“We need to be focussing on the humans: The animals are not the issue, the animals are not the problem.

“Banning these breeds is not going to help anything,” she added.

This dog looks like an XL bully and because of this, at the end of the year, the best case scenario he will have to wear a muzzle when he goes out.

“He is terrified of a muzzle and he doesn’t need to wear on, he runs away from rabbits that’s how ferocious and terrifying he is.”

Because the XL bully isn’t recognised as a breed in the UK, dog owners will be waiting to see how the government makes their decision on what dogs will be banned. But going on measurements alone, there is a chance that Henry, and many other crossbreeds like him, will fall under the ban.

She went on to say she couldn’t even begin to think about the worst case scenario “and there are going to be so many dogs in a similar position to him and it just absolutely breaks my heart”.

“Now is the time to use your voice. Get out there, write to your MP, talk to people, they need to know this is not the answer, this is not the way forward.

“My heart is breaking for anyone and everyone that has an XL Bully or a dog that looks like one because it is going to be a horrible few months.

“Please sign the petition - https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/643611- please get your voice out there, shout because this isn’t the answer,” she pleaded.

There are two concurrent petitions before the government at the moment.

One is to make XL Bully a banned dog breed in the Dangerous Dogs Act with 26,535 signatures.

The other says that bad owners are to blame, not the breed, with 576,361 signatures.