Government officials remove more than 6,000 names from petition calling for no confidence vote in David Cameron

But the petition has still received more than 188,000 'genuine' signatures - easily passing the 100,000 threshold for the motion to be considered for debate in Parliament

David Cameron introduced the e-petition initiative after entering Downing Street in 2010 (PA)

Civil servants have been removing signatures from a petition calling for MPs to debate a no confidence vote in David Cameron.

More than 6,000 “fraudulent” names were removed from the e-petition, which accuses Mr Cameron of causing "devastation for the poorest in society for the last 5 years".

But despite the Government removing the 6,208 signatures, the petition has won the backing of more than 188,000 people.

MPs on the Petition’s Committee will decide whether MPs should debate the motion.

Any petition that is submitted to Parliament's e-petition website and attracts more than 100,000 signatures in less than six months is automatically put forward to the Committee, while petitions that pass 10,000 signatures receive a response from the Government.

However the no confidence vote petition has yet to receive a response, despite passing the 10,000 threshold more than three months ago.

Explaining why the signatures have been removed, a spokeswoman for the House of Commons said: “The Government Digital Service investigates signature patterns to check for fraudulent activity on petitions.

“6208 signatures which matched more than one of the criteria indicating fraud have been removed from the Petition calling for a vote of no confidence in David Cameron.

“Much like the traditional paper petitioning system which asks people to provide an address and signature, the e-petitions system aims to strike a balance between allowing people to easily register their support for issues which are important to them, whilst discouraging dishonesty.”

The petition, which was launched by Kelly Teeboon who describes herself as a "radical feminist" and socialist, states: “We cannot afford another 5 years of Tory rule, with the recent welfare reform that will cause nothing but immense poverty in the UK.”

Mr Cameron introduced the e-petition initiative when he entered Downing Street in 2010 in a bid to boost democracy and transparency.