It was standing room only at the House of Commons ethics committee hearing today.

That's a story in itself, but it's what happened later that has everyone talking.

The committee is trying to decide what, if anything, it wants to examine in regards to the Mulroney-Schreiber affair.

All the opposition parties want to deal with it and they say they also want to call Karlheinz Schreiber and former prime minister Brian Mulroney as witnesses to testify about their dealings.

But the committee didn't even get close to that today.

Although there were multiple motions on the table, the chair of the committee, Liberal MP Paul Szabo, wouldn't hear any of them.

He questioned their admissibility and asked members to explain their positions.

That didn't get very far either.

As the clock struck noon (the official end of the committee hearing,) Szabo shut the whole thing down without any motion getting heard at all.

Chaos ensued.

NDP MP Pat Martin threw a pencil across the room and cursed. Bloc Quebecois member Michel Guimond started yelling. Tories quickly left the room. And reporters braced for action.

Martin explained things this way, "We got screwed."

Meanwhile, the clock is ticking. Schreiber could be deported as early as December 1st, which means if the committee wants to hear from him, they need to get their ducks in a row.

They'll go back at it this coming Thursday.