Readout from start of today's Cabinet meeting

The Prime Minister said that we mourn all those we have lost and send our deepest sympathies to their families, friends and loved ones.

The Prime Minister said the last year had also shown the great strengths of the British public, which had demonstrated such resilience and fortitude and had shown such willingness to work together for a common good.

The Prime Minister and Cabinet paid tribute to the extraordinary service of everyone in the NHS, social care and in the public sector over the past year, along with all those who had kept the country going - from bus drivers to shop workers.

The Prime Minister said the ability of British scientists to respond to the pandemic had been incredible.

He said that, if asked last March, he would not have believed it would have been possible to have developed a vaccine and delivered it to half of the U.K adult population within 12 months.

The Prime Minister said this was an absolutely astonishing achievement, which is a tribute to British science but also to British business.