A campaign has been launched to remove the name of the 19th-century prime minister William Gladstone – who defended the interests of slave owners – from a Liverpool University building.

Student Alisha Raithatha launched a poll on the Liverpool Student Guild website calling on the university to use the redevelopment of the Roscoe and Gladstone halls of residence as an opportunity to “reject a racially marred legacy”.

Writing on the website, she said the politics of the liberal politician – who served as prime minister for 12 years spread over four terms – were “funded by his father Sir John Gladstone’s wealth, which was built on the back the slave trade”.

“William Gladstone is known to have fought for reparations for slave traders like his father during the abolition of the trade, as well as not being in favour of the abolition,” Raithatha wrote. “We believe that someone with this controversial background should not have a university hall named after them, especially in a city where we try hard not to forget the atrocities that took place on our docks.”

The poll has so far received 60 “likes”, enough to mean the issue will be discussed by the Liverpool Guild of Students on 21 November. Sean Turner, president of the guild, said the meeting would include “50 randomly selected and demographically representative students [who] will discuss the idea and come to a consensus on what action, if any, should be taken”.

Raithatha described the coupling of Gladstone’s name with that of William Roscoe, a leading abolitionist, as “strange”. She suggested the building be called simply Roscoe, or renaming the halls after a notable alumnus such as the poet Carol Ann Duffy or the journalist Jon Snow.

Another option would be to avoid “any future controversy” by not naming the building after an individual at all, she said.

Richard Kemp, leader of the Liberal Democrats in Liverpool, told the Liverpool Echo the debate was tokenistic and that Gladstone was “a worthy recipient of honours”. “He was born on Rodney Street [in Liverpool], and was the only person who has been prime minister on four occasions,” he said.

“His government laid the basis of the welfare state, widened who could vote and did so many things we take for granted in this country. We should be incredibly proud of him. Gladstone was without doubt an abolitionist – precisely what he argued to get it through is not for me to doubt.”

The Liverpool campaign is the latest attempt to get the names of colonialists and sslave trade sympathisers removed from public buildings and monuments. In April, the Bristol music venue Colston Hall was forced to ditch its “toxic name”, given to it in honour of the 17th-century slave trader Edward Colston. In 2015, students at Oxford University mounted a campaign to have a statue of the mining magnate and politician Cecil Rhodes removed from Oriel College.