Labor frontbencher and former party leader Bill Shorten tests positive to Covid-19

Labor’s NDIS spokesman Bill Shorten has been knocked off the campaign trail as the critical pre-poll voting period begins.

Labor frontbencher and former leader Bill Shorten has tested positive to Covid-19.

Mr Shorten, the party’s NDIS and Government Services spokesman, made the announcement on Twitter on Saturday morning.

Bill Shorten announced he had tested positive on Saturday. Photo: NCA NewsWire/Luis Enrique Ascui

“Never good timing for anyone so will be in iso for a week and then free for final week of the campaign,” he said.

“A good reminder to take care of ourselves and one another, distance where you can, open the windows and do regular RATS.”

Mr Shorten’s diagnosis is a blow for Labor as the election campaign enters a critical final two weeks and pre-poll voting begins on Monday.

Opinion polls show Labor with a narrow national two-party preferred lead over the Coalition, but with many voters still undecided, the election result could go either way.

Mr Shorten will be in isolation for a week. Photo: NCA NewsWire/Luis Enrique Ascui

Before his diagnosis, Mr Shorten had been visiting marginal must-win seats around country to promote Labor’s six point plan to improve the NDIS and pledge to hold a Royal Commission into the government’s Robodebt scandal.

On Friday he defended Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese’s failure to recite the six points in Labor’s NDIS plan earlier in the week.

“The last person who never made a mistake was up on a cross 2000 years ago,” Mr Shorten told the ABC.

“Anthony’s done a great job getting us to a competitive position and I know that when it comes to NDIS, Mr Morrison can make all the cheap shops he likes, the reality is there’s only one major party with any policies on the NDIS and that’s Labor.”

Mr Shorten is not the first Labor frontbencher to have been knocked off the campaign trial with Covid. Mr Albanese recently recovered and Labor’s Home Affairs spokeswoman Kristina Keneally also caught the virus earlier on in the campaign period.