Dr Patrick Hart, a GP who compared himself to the Suffragettes, has had his medical licence suspended for a further ten months after a tribunal found he showed "no remorse" for smashing up petrol pumps during a Just Stop Oil protest. The Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) panel ruled that Hart displayed "contempt both for certain laws and the Tribunal process," having made clear he believed both were wrong to punish him. The case matters because it underscores the tension between professional medical regulation and doctors' personal activism, particularly when that activism involves criminal convictions and a refusal to acknowledge wrongdoing.

Hart, who qualified as a doctor in 2010 and worked at Bridge View Medical Practice in Bristol, used a hammer, chisel and orange spray paint to damage 16 Esso petrol pumps at a service station on the M25 in Thurrock, Essex, in August 2022, causing £11,000 of criminal damage and shutting the forecourt for 24 hours. He was jailed for 12 months, with the judge ruling the offence was deliberate and committed while he was on bail for an earlier protest. He also took part in a 2023 pitch invasion at the Premiership Rugby Final at Twickenham, of which he was acquitted, and previously received a ten-month suspension from the MPTS in 2025 before this latest sanction extended his time out of practice.