Separated parents who share custody of their children will be able to move them between their homes after an amendment to state-of-emergency rules.

Changes to the shelter-in- place order included a provision to allow parents who do not live together to leave home between 7am and 7pm to take children to the other parent “to give effect to an agreement between the parents”.

The amendments came into effect on Monday.

A divorced mother, who last week criticised the earlier policy, thanked the Government for the change.

She said: “It's a real relief to see the Government has taken action to amend the rules and bring families back together by recognising the fact that co-parenting pairs and their children should be treated as one family unit.”

The Government had earlier insisted that children should remain at the home of the parent they were with when the shelter-in-place regulations came into force.

However, David Burt, the Premier, said last week that “legitimate concerns” had been raised about parts of the shelter-in-place order and that they would be considered by a Cabinet sub-committee.