This week, Wycombe MP Steve Baker writes exclusively to Bucks Free Press readers:

Last Sunday saw a reduced Remembrance commemoration in High Wycombe and across the country.

When I laid my wreath on the war memorial, I thought of those servicemen and women who gave their lives to fight tyranny whilst the government is currently removing people’s liberty to save life itself.

Lockdowns cost lives, whether in undiagnosed cancer treatments, deteriorating mental health, and missed A&E appointments, in addition to the impact on young people’s education, job prospects and our soaring debts.

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We must urgently find a way of living with the virus until vaccines are deployed, rather than destroying livelihoods.

Protecting the NHS for us all includes protecting our capacity to pay for it.

The announcement that there is likely to be a vaccine by the end of the year has shifted the country’s outlook.

If a safe and effective vaccine can be given, then we can hope life returns to normal much faster.

Along with other Conservative MPs, I have formed the Covid Recovery Group to bring science and truth to the debate surrounding lockdown restrictions and the response to the virus.

The group has set out Three Guiding Principles before the vote about what happens when the lockdown ends on December 2.

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These principles are to undertake and publish full cost-benefit analysis of restrictions on a regional basis; to end the monopoly on advice of government scientists, allowing competitive multi-disciplinary expert groups to shape the debate; and significantly to boost the performance of NHS Test and Trace by shifting resources to local public health teams to lead contact tracing, breaking the chain of transmission.

For this lockdown to succeed on its own terms, we must all comply with the rules.

The time must be used to transform the effectiveness of NHS Test and Trace and to institute a vaccine programme so that we can avoid further devastating cycles of lockdowns and restrictions.