'I'm a freedom-loving Conservative... I can't wait to get us back to living by personal responsibility'

"I will tell you where I was standing when I found out the vaccine was approved. Here! I was standing on this point." A grinning Matt Hancock clenches his hands into two fists to demonstrate how he reacted.

It is Friday night, and the Health Secretary is still in buoyant mood in his top floor office at the Department of Health and Social Care on London's Victoria Street.

And well he should be. After the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency approved the Pfizer-Biontech vaccine last week, Britain will become the first country in the world to start administering the drug. The global fightback against coronavirus will start in an NHS hospital.

Leaning forward on his white office sofa, Mr Hancock says emphatically: "Tuesday is V day. We are going to vaccinate right across the country, right across the whole UK.

"There will be people vaccinated in Northern Ireland, people vaccinated in Wales, in Scotland in every part of England because I want people to know that this is for everyone equally according to clinical need. Right across the country help is on its way."

Britain has ordered 40 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine. Some 800,000 are already here, and 50 hospitals across England will then commence the biggest immunisation programme in history.

The over-80s, as well as care home workers, will be first to receive the jab, along with NHS workers who are at higher risk. GPs and other primary care staff will start to administer the jab next week.

Mr Hancock describes the logistics of this operation as "challenging". The vials of vaccine are packed into pizza box-shaped packaging and can only be opened in conditions approved by the medicines regulator.

"It's a bit like transporting eggs, you have to make sure once they get there, then they're good," he says. "I want to get all the vulnerable people of the whole UK vaccinated, as soon as possible."

I ask if this can be achieved by the end of January. "I can't give a date on it because it depends on how quickly they can manufacture this stuff", he says. Mr Hancock wants to have millions of doses by Christmas "and then we go as fast as we can".

The next challenge for Mr Hancock will be persuading enough of us to take the vaccine. A major public information celebrity-led campaign similar to the Government's "Stay Home. Protect the NHS. Save Lives" and  "Hands, Face, Space" campaigns will start in the next fortnight.

It is likely to be fronted by "a combination of clinicians, trusted voices amongst the public" as well as "those of us who've made decisions about it. There is a public appetite for us to put our jabs where our mouths are".

The Health Secretary adds: "We want to encourage people. I say to anyone who can help us to persuade the public that vaccination is a good thing – when the NHS calls you, come forward and show the confidence in the science that has been proved to work."

Elderly role models will be sought to set the example, and Mr Hancock says: "There are some absolutely wonderful nonagenarians who can help the country, and – given our leadership on this – help the world to be confident to come forward and be vaccinated."

I ask Mr Hancock if he is thinking of two particular "wonderful nonagenarians" – the Queen (94 years old) and the Duke of Edinburgh (99 years old) – who might be called on to do their duty for the cameras. There is a long pause before he replies: "I am the Health Secretary and it would be inappropriate to comment."

Separately, the fake news unit at the Cabinet Office, which was set up to counter fears about a no-deal Brexit, is preparing messaging to take on the anti-vaxxers.

"In the same way that we've been working on the vaccine itself for months, we've been working on ensuring a positive narrative, and the right information comes out," he says.

The sudden optimism around the UK's approach to the Covid-19 pandemic underlines the game-changing nature of the vaccine being made available in the UK.

And there could be more good news with Mr Hancock suggesting that MHRA-approval for AstraZeneca's vaccine, developed with Oxford University, could be less than three weeks away, saying: "It may come before Christmas, it may come early in the New Year."  

If authorised, AstraZeneca is expecting to have up to 4 million doses ready for the UK by the end of the year and 40 million by the end of March 2021. Mr Hancock says: "The majority of the vaccination will be in January and February, and the scale of that depends on Pfizer's manufacturing facilities, MHRA's approval of AstraZeneca and AstraZeneca's manufacturing capabilities.

"The speed at which we vaccinate obviously is determined by how fast the manufacturer can produce it. I've tasked the NHS with the simple mission of vaccinating as quickly as the manufacturers can produce."

Mr Hancock feels a certain degree of justification for his support of the second national lockdown and his faith in a vaccine to chart the course of the UK – and the world – out of the coronavirus crisis, saying: "I can't tell you how many people said to me that we'd never get there before Christmas. I have a reputation for being optimistic – but that's been proved right."

He admits that the vaccine means tougher restrictions for tens of millions of people might be eased more quickly, adding: "There's no doubt that having the vaccine early will bring forward the moment when we can get rid of these blasted restrictions, but until then we have got to follow them. Help is on its way."

The Government's position before the vaccine was approved was that the tier restrictions are likely to be in place until Easter, which next year falls on April 4. I ask Mr Hancock if the advent of the vaccine could now change how long the country needs to be in restrictions in the first quarter of next year.

"Yeah, yes, it will," he replies, adding: "We'll keep watching what happens to the epidemic. But the more people you vaccinate, the more lives you save and the fewer people who die, the sooner you can lift the restrictions – it's as simple as that."

Britain could even be in a position to open its economy before the European Union, where the vaccine has not yet been approved.

"Because we can vaccinate earlier, we can protect people quicker, and I hope we can get out of these measures, as soon as possible," the Health Secretary says.

However it will take several weeks before the vaccine takes effect after being administered, and he cautions that vaccinated people could still pass on the disease. This means the "elbow bump greeting might be here for a while", he adds.

Nevertheless, he is happy to speculate that one day he will be able to set a date for a "liberation day" when Britons will be freed of Covid restrictions.

"I'm a freedom-loving Conservative, and I can't wait for us to get back to living by mutual respect and personal responsibility not laws set in Parliament," he says.

"At some point, we'll be able to set the date when we can get rid of these restrictions – and you couldn't have said that only two weeks ago."