University students will vote on whether to construct a 250ft iron statue of ex-prime minister Margaret Thatcher.

A petition, launched by the Kent University Conservative Association, (KUCA), calls for the giant statue - modelled after the Colossus of Rhodes - to be built on campus "across from the University's nightclub, The Venue."

The petition continues: "The placement across from the nightclub would encourage good and sensible behaviour under the gaze of the 250 foot Colossus.

Margaret Thatcher

"Appropriately the statue would be constructed almost entirely of Iron at a 46:1 scale.

"At this scale the Iron Lady's handbag would be approximately 30 foot tall. The plan is to construct the handbag of a highly polished bronze.

Strategically placed this would allow the sun to reflect off the handbag at certain times during the day.

"The statue would then serve the purpose of being a literal "shining testament to liberty".

"While the ingenious polished bronze handbag would also allow the statue to dazzle the eyes of those lefties who would the Colossus [sic]."

The man behind the petition is Emilio Kyprianou, chairman of KUCA.

He told The Tab: “This was started as an attempt to highlight problems with the current petition system. Having said that, we are going to run with it, this could be a real positive for Kent.”

The petition is currently 'collecting signatures' prior to a vote.

This is the second time Conservative students have argued for a massive statue of Margaret Thatcher to be built at the University of Kent.

In 2013 the association called for the construction of a smaller 200ft statue, made entirely of bronze.

At 250ft this new statue would dwarf the original Colossus of Rhodes, which stood at a comparably modest 98ft tall, despite being one of the seven wonders of the world.

Built to mark Rhodes' victory over the ruler of Cyprus in 280 BC, the statue was destroyed by an earthquake in 226 BC.

However, in December last year a group of architects launched a campaign to build a new Colossus more than four times the height of the original at 443ft.