A grandad who says he struggled to attend life-saving dialysis appointments at Stevenage's Lister Hospital - due to a fuel shortage after climate activists blockaded oil depots - has blasted the protesters' actions as "selfish".

David Cullen, who lives in Stevenage and was a Bedwell councillor for 36 years, must have dialysis three times a week because his kidneys do not work properly.

Last month, the 78-year-old experienced difficulty in finding a petrol station in the town with fuel so he could drive his car to his vital appointments.

Climate activist groups Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion blockaded 10 critical oil depots, including Buncefield in Hemel Hempstead, for more than two weeks in April, causing disruption to fuel deliveries.

This month, the group has been protesting in Scotland.

Mr Cullen said: "To demonstrate is sacrosanct, but it's the wrong target. If they blocked off government buildings, then fine, but they are affecting the general public. You've got doctors needing to visit patients, patients going into hospital for treatment - everybody needs fuel.

"It's usually the people least able to help themselves who are caught in the attack. It's selfish.

"I was stressed. I had to tour the town looking for fuel.

"I get angry when selfish actions affect vulnerable people. People need to talk about it rationally."

Just Stop Oil launched in February and says it is using civil resistance with the aim of ensuring the UK Government commits to halting new fossil fuel licensing and production.

A spokesman for the group said: "Just Stop Oil supporters are sorry that they have to be doing what they are doing and for the impact it is having on ordinary citizens.

"None of them want to be doing this. They don't like to be disrupting ordinary people's lives, but they feel they have been forced into it by our heartless government who, in the face of a cost of living crisis and a climate catastrophe, chooses to make it worse by giving the go-ahead for drilling for more oil and gas in the North Sea, rather than ensuring a quick and fair transition away from fossil fuels.

"Just Stop Oil supporters have targeted oil companies and, while we recognise how that has affected people needing to drive to important appointments, the fact is that the disruption and potential civil unrest and societal collapse resulting from food and water shortages and loss of livelihoods due to droughts, floods, hurricanes and heatwaves will be far far greater.

"Just Stop Oil has made it quite clear all along that the government can stop all this disruption immediately by agreeing to halt all future licensing and consents for the exploration, development and production of fossil fuels in the UK.

"It is vital that our government takes on its responsibility to protect all their citizens and that means reducing our dependence on oil and gas - for example by a mass roll out of insulation, free public transport for all and turning to renewable energy.

"Previous methods of influencing the government have failed - writing to MPs, protest marches, lobbying, petitions, sitting outside government departments - and the situation is urgent, as was made clear by the International Energy Agency last year."