(Ottawa) A Liberal-dominated Commons committee refused Monday to vote on a Conservative request to investigate the activities of two scientists fired in 2021 from a high-security biomedical laboratory because of their ties to Beijing.
Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong asked the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics to call certain witnesses, including representatives of the Public Health Agency of Canada.
But Liberal and NDP MPs on the committee ended debate on the Conservative motion by a vote of six to four. Liberal MP Iqra Khalid had earlier argued that hearings on the matter were unnecessary and did not fall within the mandate of the Commons committee.
After the vote, MP Chong accused the Liberals of wanting to perpetuate a cover-up in this matter, with the help of the New Democrats. “It is time for Parliament to take over and hold the government accountable,” he said in a statement.
More than 600 pages of documents and internal correspondence on this security issue were made public last week following the review of a special multi-party committee.
These redacted documents show that two scientists at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg were fired in January 2021 when it was learned they had failed to protect sensitive assets and information.
The two scientists, Xiangguo Qiu and her husband, Keding Cheng, downplayed their collaboration with Chinese government agencies, records show.
IMAGE TAKEN FROM A VIDEO BROADCAST BY RIDEAU HALL
Xiangguo Qiu and her husband Keding Cheng
The documents also reveal that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service concluded that Mme Qiu had repeatedly lied about the extent of her work with Chinese government agencies and refused to admit her involvement in various Chinese programs, even when evidence was presented to her.
Michael Chong told the committee on Monday that hearings were needed to examine the flow of information and intelligence within the government, to determine why Ms.me Qiu had not been noticed earlier.
Additionally, Mr. Chong told MPs, the hearings would help understand why it took years for documents relating to the firings to be made public.
In May last year, the federal government announced that three senior former judges would have the final say on what could be disclosed, and that these files would then be examined by a special committee of MPs, in a secure setting.
The Conservatives initially rejected this proposal, preferring that the files be handed over to a “regular” committee of deputies. Under a House of Commons order adopted by opposition parties in 2021 – despite the government’s objections – the documents would have been examined by the parliamentary law clerk for possible national security issues. The members of the committee, however, would have retained the right to disclose the material of their choice.
Liberal MP Khalid, a member of the special committee that ultimately reviewed the documents, defended the process on Monday. “There was no cover-up,” she said. We have done significant work over many, many months to get to the bottom of this. »