A candidate who had hoped to represent the Conservative Party on the Isle of Wight Council has stood down and locked his Twitter account, after tweets emerged in which he called two female MPs 'vile'.

Stuart Brown was planning to stand for Ryde West at the elections on May 6, but said he did not wish to be a 'distraction', saying his words had been 'misconstrued' and tweets supporting women had not been taken into account.

He said he was not a misogynist.

Read his statement in full below...

Earlier yesterday, Mr Brown posted on Facebook to say he was 'looking forward to a positive campaign', in response to a post from Isle of Wight Council leader Cllr Dave Stewart, who leads the Conservative councillor at County Hall.

Stuart Brown had also planned to stand for Ryde Town Council at the upcoming election.

Using his Twitter account, he posted 'You really are vile' to Labour MP for Coventry, Zarah Sultana.

Isle of Wight County Press:

Isle of Wight County Press:

He posted 'vile woman' to the Former Shadow Secretary of State for Women and Equalities, Labour's Dawn Butler, after she tweeted about the Black Lives Matter campaign. 

Mr Brown has now locked down his Twitter account and says he will no longer stand as a candidate.

Isle of Wight County Press:

In a statement issued overnight, Mr Brown said: “Following a period of reflection I have decided that I no longer wish to stand for election to the Isle of Wight Council, as the Conservative candidate for Ryde West.

"The Conservative Party on the Island is doing a great deal of good work and has a host of excellent candidates for the upcoming election, including some exciting young men and women and I do not want this to become an unnecessary distraction for them or to detract from that excellent work.

"I expressed a view on some opposition MP’s statements that I found to be highly incendiary, but in hindsight accept that my words may have been construed in a similar incendiary way, or worse, misconstrued as something which they were not intended to be.

"I do not consider myself to be a misogynist in any way and take offence at the notion that I am.

"I do however apologise if that is how it has been interpreted. 

"When someone took the time to look through my tweets they seem to have been selective in what they decided to share and missed several that show nothing but support and admiration for women, both in politics and the wider working world, including a recent tweet celebrating international women’s day.

"I will now look to devote my time to helping my community in other ways.”

David Pugh, former Isle of Wight Council leader and chairman of the Conservative Association on the Isle of Wight told the County Press he welcomed Mr Brown's decision.