COST OF KILLING

Knight is advertising the chance to take home an elephant trophy for $14,700 – around £10,600 – plus hunting fees.

He has also offered lion trophies for $20,000 (£14,500) and buffalo and leopard for $5,000 each (£3,612).

Hunting fees are extra and can cost up to $1,800 a day (£1,300) for a 21-day package.

■ Prices also exclude flights

and taxidermy.

BIG MOMENT: Margaret gets first jab

WHEN Boris Johnson set up the Vaccine Task Force in May last year, he gave it a clear goal. The instruction was unambiguous: to “consolidate Britain’s position at the forefront of global research and development”.

And amid all the Government’s botched pandemic failures, the vaccine programme shines internationally as a stunning success.

It has been a victory for British scientific skill and ingenuity, industrial scale and expertise, and political determination. The wheels began to turn in early January last year when Oxford University scientists realised the world was facing a deadly pandemic. At a crisis meeting, Professor Sarah Gilbert, a vaccine researcher, revealed she had devised a possible vaccine based on a formula previously used to fight Ebola.

The race had begun. Her team’s biggest fear was Donald Trump would buy up all vaccine stocks.

Astrazeneca signed a production deal last April, telling No10 that it would produce jabs at cost price. The Government bought in early, doing deals with another six companies, including Pfizer/biontech. Johnson set up the JVT under entrepreneur and biochemist Kate Bingham, and told the Treasury to start investing in protection against this and future viruses. Health Secretary Matt Hancock boasted Britain’s exit from the EU allowed faster approval – a claim slated at the time but which gained credibility with the Brussels farce over supplies and comparative low jab levels on the Continent.

China and Russia have been marketing their own vaccines around the world. But they have not been subject to the same rigorous testing standards as Britain’s regulators, who pulled out all the stops to deliver safely in record time. Margaret Keenan, 90, was first in line for her jab as UK doses began to roll out on December 8 – and the huge national effort has seen an army of volunteers, including celebritites, pitch in to help.

Downton actor Hugh Bonneville and TV presenter Vernon Kay were among star volunteers this weekend while Ruth Langsford was proud to pose while she got her shot.

Today marks the symbolic target on the road to getting Britain back on its feet. There is growing speculation it might do the same for Boris’s political prospects – at least in the short term.