A number of Liberals have questions about their missing colleagues, and their party's whip Rodger Cuzner, after the House of Commons vote debacle last night.

Yesterday Liberal MP Bob Rae introduced a motion asking the government to include a "full range of reproductive health services" in its G8 initiative on maternal and child health in developing nations.  The motion was defeated 138-144 after three LIberal MPs voted against their party's proposal, two MPs abstained and more than a dozen simply didn't show up to vote.

Here's what we know so far: 

The Liberals knew in advance that four of their MPs would be absent from the vote, yet only one MP, Mario Silva, had his vote paired.  Marlene Jennings had eye surgery yesterday, Anita Neville is in Poland (with NDP colleague Judy Wasylycia-Leis) on a tour of former concentration camps, and Gerard Kennedy was attending to a family matter.  So why didn't the whip ensure that those other votes were paired?

CORRECTION/UPDATE: Albina Guarnieri was absent and has offered a reason: she says she stayed away because she's pro-life. (A previous version of this post listed her as abstaining.)

Others who were absent with (so far) no explanation include Andrew Kania, Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Lawrence MacAulay, Joe Volpe, Stéphane Dion, Derek Lee, Alan Tonks and Jim Karygiannis.

Some MPs have said Leader Michael Ignatieff must take a hard line with these MPs, pointing out that the word "abortion" wasn't even in yesterday's motion and that promoting a woman's right to contraception is a pretty long-standing and central belief among Liberals.  When asked repeatedly about discipline today after the Liberals' weekly caucus meeting, Ignatieff said the party is dealing with the matter internally.

As for the three men who voted against last night's motion, their votes were only somewhat of a surprise.  Paul Szabo, John McKay and Dan McTeague are long-time opponents of abortion.  Yet it is unclear why, on a whipped vote, they voted against their party's motion instead of "going missing" for a few minutes. 

As for the registered abstention, again, there are questions as to why Gurbax Malhi sat on his hands in the House instead of also excusing himself during the vote.

2nd UPDATE: Borys Wrzesnewskyj explains his absence last night by saying he had permission to abstain from the vote and continued with committee work. 

Wrzesnewskyj, who also says he is opposed to abortion, says he's in favour of provisions pertaining to contraception.  However, he says he felt uneasy about the wording of his party's motion because he felt support for abortion was inferred. 

The MP says if abortion truly is the underlying question, he would welcome the House of Commons having a clear and open debate on the issue.