Suffolk is being urged to “stick with it” after the county entered Tier 2 of the enhanced regional lockdown system – but aims to return to less restrictions.

The Suffolk Resilience Forum is calling on the county to stick to the new restrictions, enforced from today, in the hopes it will see the county return to the Tier 1 restrictions imposed on it before the second national lockdown.

As part of the campaign, the resilience forum is pushing the message “this is our present, not our future”.

Under the new restrictions, the mixing of households indoors is now banned unless it is with a support bubble, pubs are only allowed to sell alcohol alongside a substantial meal and the “Rule of Six” is in force outdoors.

It is hoped that by following the rules, households will again be able to mix indoors and wet-led pubs will be allowed to reopen should the county move down into Tier 1.

To reach that, the resilience forum is asking people to follow national guidelines:

•Keep washing your hands

•Keep wearing your face mask

•Keep social distancing

•Don’t meet indoors and follow the Rule of Six outdoors

•Keep looking out for each other

The return to Tier 1 restrictions could have been likely if not for a spike in cases in Babergh and Ipswich, while Mid Suffolk and West Suffolk have consistently recorded some of the lowest case rates in the country alongside East Suffolk.