CHILDREN will be able to travel across lockdown areas for sporting activities, it has been confirmed.

First Minister Mark Drakeford confirmed a further amendment to the lockdown restrictions in Wales.

At the Welsh Government briefing he said children will be allowed to take part in organised sporting activities if these take place outside of county borders.

The Leader previously reported that many children were missing out on sports due to restrictions meaning they could not travel outside of their lockdown area.

A petition was launched to get Welsh Government to amend their rules.

At the briefing, Mr Drakeford said: “Last week, we changed local restriction rules to enable people who live alone to form a temporary bubble with another household in local authority area to deal with loneliness and isolation.

“Now we intend to amend the regulation to allow children to take part in organised sporting activity if these take place outside a county boundary.

“I know these are small changes in a difficult national picture. That difficult national picture is reflected in the figures we have seen this week.

“The number of people admitted to hospital has been rising over the last seven days. More people are testing positive every day.

“There are more reports of coronavirus in care homes and sadly, more people are dying from this deadly disease.”

When asked about fatigue over the restrictions, Mr Drakeford said the measures are a ‘big ask’ but the big picture continues to be that most people want to do the right thing.

At the Welsh Government briefing, the FM said the country must work together to ‘find a way out of this’.

He says the changes are small signs of how we can move restrictions out of people’s lives provided they ‘act together’.

The peak of the virus is expected to hit Wales towards the end of December, based on a predicted model released by Welsh Government.

The FM says there is no new concluded modelling, but this is getting updated all the time.

He added that the early onset of the virus has been 'sharper' than what was originally predicted but they will continue to seek advice on whether the timing of the peak will need to be changed but they do not have that information yet.

When asked about additional restrictions on the hospitality industry, he told the country that restrictions will be placed where the evidence proves it is needed.

However, he added that ‘now is not the time’ to lift the travel restrictions.

The First Minister previously wrote to Prime Minister Boris Johnson calling on him to stop people travelling from coronavirus hotspots into Wales.

He said he was ‘disappointed’ to not receive a reply from the Prime Minister about this but has heard speculation that an announcement will be made on Monday.

He added that if Welsh Government is not confident UK Government will do the ‘right thing’ and prevent people spreading the virus, then they will rely on their own powers which they ‘do have and will use’.

Mr Drakeford said he is prepared to wait until Monday to see if an announcement is made.

He went on to say it is not 'fair' or 'sensible' to allow travel to high case areas over the border.

The First Minister said this would not be the right thing to do and this was not a border control issue but trying to protect parts of the country where there is no need for Covid restrictions.

By travelling, people will take the virus with them.