All MPs who attended NSW Parliament on Tuesday and Wednesday have been ordered into isolation after Agriculture Minister Adam Marshall tested positive for COVID-19.
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NSW Hunter Valley Labor MPs were livid on Thursday morning at the way the positive case had been handled, saying they had been left in the dark after sharing a room with Mr Marshall on Tuesday.
"It's a super-spreader event in Parliament that they've failed to control," Maitland MP Jenny Aitchison said on Thursday morning after coming down with cold-like symptoms on the drive home from Sydney on Wednesday afternoon.
The Hunter MPs are angry that they have not been identified as close contacts of Mr Marshall after joining the Nationals MP on the floor of Parliament on budget day on Tuesday.
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Swansea MP Yasmin Catley said she had been about a metre from Mr Marshall during Question Time but had not received advice from NSW Health that she should be in isolation and getting tested.
That changed at 10.47am on Thursday when Parliament sent all MPs a message telling them to isolate pending further medical advice.
MPs said they and their staff had potentially shared lifts with Mr Marshall, who says he is asymptomatic.
Mr Marshall and three other Nationals MPs went into isolation on Wednesday after dining together at Christo's Pizzeria in Paddington, which NSW Health later identified as a venue of concern.
He was also in a party room meeting at Parliament with Coalition MPs on Tuesday before Treasurer Dominic Perrottet tabled the budget.
Health Minister Brad Hazzard said he had received a message from NSW Health identifying him as a close contact and ordering him into isolation for two weeks.
Regional MPs were given pairs, a parliamentary process which matches absences from either side of politics, to return home on Wednesday afternoon, but Ms Aitchison was forced to turn back when she developed symptoms.
She, Ms Catley, Port Stephens MP Kate Washington, Lake Macquarie's Greg Piper, Charlestown's Jodie Harrison, Newcastle's Tim Crakanthorp and Wallsend's Sonia Hornery said on Thursday that they had all been tested and were awaiting results.
The Nationals' Upper Hunter MP, Dave Layzell, had responded to a request for comment.
Ms Aitchison, Ms Catley, Ms Harrison, Mr Crakanthorp, Ms Hornery and Ms Washington said they had received one dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is understood to be less effective against the highly infectious Delta variant of the virus affecting Sydney.
Wallsend MP Sonia Hornery also said she had sat close to Mr Marshall in Parliament.
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