'A business requiring you to have a vaccine before using it is not akin to a dictatorship'

30 November 2020, 20:41

Iain Dale points out private businesses requiring vaccines is not akin to dictatorship

By EJ Ward

Iain Dale was quick to point out to this caller that a cinema requiring a customer to have had a Covid vaccine was not a "dictatorship".

When this caller suggested he thought businesses requiring customers to have had the Covid-19 vaccine before they could use their services was akin to a "dictatorship", LBC's Iain Dale had a swift answer for him.

Dave from Broxbourne told LBC he thought we were "getting to a point of a dictatorship situation."

But Iain was swift to point out to the caller that he might have a point if it was the Government setting the requirements.

And when Dave said to him it was "one and the same," Iain pointed out "it's not."

"You can't be in a dictatorship because the Odeon cinema says you have to have a vaccination to get into one of their cinemas."

Matt Hancock urges people to take Covid-19 tests

The conversation comes after Health minister Nadhim Zahawi earlier told reporters the government was "looking at the technology" around "immunity passports" to show when someone had received the Covid-19 vaccine.

"And, of course, a way of people being able to inform their GP that they have been vaccinated," he added.

Mr Zahawi said: "But, also, I think you'll probably find that restaurants and bars and cinemas and other venues, sports venues, will probably also use that system - as they have done with the app.

"I think that in many ways the pressure will come from both ways, from service providers who'll say 'look, demonstrate to us that you have been vaccinated'.

"But, also, we will make the technology as easy and accessible as possible."

Asked if that meant people who did not have a vaccination would be severely restricted in what they could do, the minister said: "I think people have to make a decision.

"But, I think you'll probably find many service providers will want to engage with this in the way they did with the app."