Voters who want to get rid of lying MP have just hours left to sign petition

A petition calling for disgraced MP Fiona Onasanya to be kicked out of her seat closes at 5pm this afternoon.

Ms Onasanya, 35, became the first female MP to be jailed after lying to police about who was driving her car to avoid a speeding ticket.

She was booted out of the Labour Party after who are now backing a petition in her Peterborough constituency to unseat her.

The now independent MP served just 28 days of a three-month prison sentence earlier this year and has carried on receiving her £77,379 parliamentary salary.

If 10 per cent of eligible Peterborough voters sign the petition – around 7,000 people – Ms Onasanya will be forced out and a by-election called.

Ms Onasanya, who is a solicitor by profession, will be allowed to stand for re-election under recall rules.

If a by-election is called, Nigel Farage’s Brexit party plans to use the opportunity to get its first MP by standing in Peterborough.

Recall petitions are launched when MPs receive a custodial sentence, including suspended sentences, are barred from the Commons for 10 sitting days or are convicted of providing false information about their expenses.

The petition to expel Ms Onasanya will cost about £500,000, funded by central government.

On the eve of the petition’s launch on March 19, Ms Onasanya shared a video of her pleading with voters to keep her in power.

Speaking in front of an image of a New York skyline she insists she is innocent of perverting the course of justice.

Ms Onasanya, who became the first MP in history to wear an electronic tag in the Commons, lost a legal challenge against her conviction in the High Court last month.

The petition has been been backed by both the Conservative Party and Labour as well as Unite the Union, the Communications Workers Union and former UKIP campaigner Jay Beecher.

The Labour Party won Peterborough by a margin of just 607 votes in the 2017 general election, snatching the seat from Tory Stewart Jackson who held the seat since 2005.

Peterborough City Council said votes will be counted in private this evening and sent to House of Commons speaker John Bercow.

He will then let the council know when it can announce the result.

Ms Onasanya’s was not subject to automatic removal as an MP because her sentence was shorter than 12 months.

Constituents can sign the petition at designated locations across Peterborough.

Jurors at the Old Bailey were told Ms Onasanya colluded with her brother Festus after her car was clocked speeding at 41mph in a 30mph zone in the village of Thorney, near Peterborough, in July 2017.

She was sent a notice of intended prosecution to fill out, but it was sent back naming Aleks Antipow, an acquaintance of her brother, who was away visiting his parents in Russia.

Mr Onasanya, 34, from Cambridge, was jailed for 10 months after admitting three counts of perverting the course of justice over speeding, including incident in Thorney.