Coming up on the Pest and podcast, what can we learn from Israel, which is ahead of the rest of the world in terms of the way it's vaccinating its people and is now easing lockdown.

What does it mean in terms of whether we need, for example, vaccine passports to go to the pub or to restaurants?

The government has made it clear. It doesn't want formal vaccine passports, but it's

certainly not telling pubs and restaurants they can't themselves introduce such rules on who

can go and enjoy a drink or a meal.

So all this is much more to discuss with Yule Eidelstein, who's the Israeli health minister,

with the Lord Chancellor Robert Buckland.

Also joining me is the brilliant writer.

You may know him from Doctor Who,

but his series, It's a Sin for Channel 4, has been making great wave.

So I'll be talking to Russell T. Davis about whether there are

parallels between the COVID crisis

and the AIDS crisis, which is very much the theme of its Ascent.

Also with me will be Steve Baker, one of the Tory backbench MPs who's really been bossing

the government around and Nas Shah, a member of Keir Stama's team.

Steve, I'm just going to start with you. You, I think, have said today that you want

probably a faster route out of lockdown than the Prime Minister is going to give us. Give us your

preferred timetable. The timetable we've picked is based very intimately on the government's

vaccine rollout plan. So they're the government's own dates. But what we've said is as people

are vaccinated, restrictions should be eased proportionately. So when would you like, for example,

hospitality to be reopened? We've just talked about the damage to that sector. I'd like

hospitality back for Easter.

...