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“There is a saying that if you can’t beat them, join them.”

That was the telling choice of words former Liberal cabinet minister Martin Cauchon settled on back in November 2011 when greeting news Huawei Canada, the subsidiary of an opaquely governed Chinese telecommunications conglomerate long encumbered by its reported links to China’s military and intelligence services, was beefing up its Ottawa operations, thanks to a $6.5-million Ontario government grant.

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Bested by NDP Leader Tom Mulcair at the polls only a few months earlier in the Montreal riding of Outremont, Cauchon was by then already embarking on a lucrative career in blue-chip deal making in China. He is now a vice-president of the Canada China Business Council, where you’ll also find Scott Bradley, the Liberal party candidate defeated in the same May 2011 federal election in Ottawa Centre, now serving on the council’s board. Bradley is also now a vice-president of Huawei Canada.