The Deputy First Minister has warned against “vaccination optimism” as a quick way out of lockdown restrictions.

John Swinney said that we will still need to be “canny” even when we are all vaccinated against Covid-19.

Mr Swinney said there are “difficult questions” around the sequencing of opening up again after lockdown.

He said: “If I have a worry about vaccination optimism, it is that people think they wont have to follow rules in place.”

He added: “People are going to have to accept some limitations on how we interact as the virus is still there and a threat to us all.

“We are going to have to take a pretty canny approach.”

Mr Swinney had earlier said the Government was on track with the vaccination programme and was “confident it would vaccinate all over 70s by the middle of February.

He said that 334,871 people have now been vaccinated.

The aim is to have all the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation JCVI priority groups, which is all over 50 and those with underlying health conditions vaccinated by early May.