A former Conservative council leader has ruled out taking on Clacton MP Douglas Carswell as the UK Independence Party candidate after his name was put in the frame.

Peter Halliday, who resigned as Conservative leader of Tendring District Council in 2013, said he is “flattered” after UKIP member Joy Broderick emailed party members suggesting he could take on the Clacton MP on the UK Independence Party ticket in an election. She told members that everybody knew, respected and trusted Mr Halliday.

Mr Carswell, who defected to UKIP from the Conservatives in 2014, announced he would now sit as an independent MP in the House of Commons after the Brexit vote and Theresa May’s appointment as Conservative leader. Former UKIP leader Nigel Farage had earlier called for Mr Carswell to be kicked out of the party. Mr Carswell has insisted there is no need for him to call a by-election.

But he has angered local UKIP members. Mrs Broderick, who is not a member of the Clacton UKIP branch but a member of the national party, said they needed to get somebody working as the candidate because UKIP could not afford to lose the Clacton seat.

She said that Mr Carswell should be renamed “Douglas the destroyer” after becoming an independent. She claimed he had not said a word to the “foot soldiers” who had got him elected after leaving UKIP.

A former Conservative, Mrs Broderick said she had “worked her socks off” to get Mr Carswell elected in 2005, when he first joined parliament.

After Mrs Broderick’s letter suggesting he should become the candidate was made public Mr Halliday told BBC Essex: “I rarely say never to anything but to be honest with you my moral compass says no [to becoming the UKIP candidate] anyway. I am a Conservative thinking person. I stood for the Conservatives because that is who I am. I left because I wasn’t happy with the surroundings and some of the members that are still there. I am not going back to a different party because my moral compass is where it is and that is what I am and what I will continue to be.”

He resigned as Tendring District Council in 2013 claiming he was “saddened and disappointed” by the actions of some fellow Conservative councillors over a planning dispute.