Liberal MPs yesterday tried and failed to block speedy hearings into why cabinet concealed evidence of Chinese security breaches at the National Microbiology Laboratory. “Why wasn’t this caught earlier?” asked Conservative MP Michael Chong (Wellington-Halton Hills, Ont.).

“It a grave and serious matter,” Chong told the Commons Special Committee on Canada-China Relations. “A government scientist clandestinely collaborated with the government and the military of the People’s Republic of China and was paid clandestinely.”

A committee majority passed MP Chong’s motion that it “unde