The plans were first spelled out in the Conservative election manifesto A plan to allow popular online petitions to be debated in Parliament within a year has been given the go ahead by the government.
Ministers will seek agreement with the authorities, including the House of Commons Procedure Committee, to give the petitions parliamentary time.
The most popular could eventually become Parliamentary bills.
Under the plans, petitions that receive a certain level of support - probably 100,000 signatures - would be debated.
The government intends to shut down the e-petitions part of the Number 10 website - which has been suspended since the general election - and open a similar facility on the Directgov website.
The new site would be more closely moderated than the old, with petitions checked closely for "eligibility".
Petitioners would have to be on the electoral roll, and Parliamentary time might also be refused if a topic had been recently debated.
In June, the Leader of the Commons, Sir George Young, said the plans - first spelt out in the Conservative manifesto - would go ahead.
He indicated at the start of December that the petitions website would be moved to Directgov.
A government source told the BBC that the plans had been recently discussed by ministers and the source was very confident they would go ahead.
The proposals have yet to be taken through cabinet, and ministers have not yet discussed them with the Speaker, John Bercow.
The consent of Mr Bercow and the Procedure Committee would almost certainly be required.
BBC News political correspondent Ross Hawkins said that allowing petitions to be drafted as Parliamentary bills would be more difficult and would take longer to put in place.
The government envisages using the private member's bill procedure, which would require an individual MP to support the measure and would be easy for other members to block.
There are no details on how planned legislation would be taken through the Lords.
Petitions were introduced to the Downing Street website by the then prime minister, Tony Blair.
The most popular petition, with more than 180,000 people in support, opposed road pricing.
More than 70,000 supported the one word suggestion that Gordon Brown should "resign".
And almost 50,000 signed up to the idea that TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson should become prime minister.
This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/uk-politics-12084525
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