An NDP MP has lost her historic bid to have members of Parliament overturn a committee decision that has stalled her bill on derelict vessels.

MPs voted by secret ballot during the past two days.

Until now, only the Speaker has been chosen by secret ballot.

Votes are normally decided either by voice or by MPs standing one at a time as their names are called by the clerk.

On Thursday morning the House of Commons Speaker Geoff Regan reported the result of the vote was negative and, "accordingly, Bill C-352 is declared non-votable."

Sheila Malcolmson walked out of the chamber and addressed reporters in the foyer of the House of Commons.

"This is unprecedented that the Liberals used their majority to prevent my bill from even being heard or voted on," she said.

"It is not sunny ways, it is not the cooperative model that [Prime Minister Justin] Trudeau promised in his mandate letters and in his election platform."

Her bill would have made the practice of simply abandoning boats and ships illegal, while also empowering the government to go after owners found guilty of dumping a derelict vessel.

Malcolmson's private member's bill was deemed non-votable by a Commons committee when the government introduced similar legislation.

Malcolmson said the government's legislation, Bill C-64, doesn't go as far as her private member's bill and she used her last appeal to keep her bill alive.

That appeal required using a 14-year-old never-before-used rule that allows an MP to appeal to the entire House of Commons to overturn her bill's non-votable status. Votes under this rule are prescribed to be held by secret ballot.

On Tuesday, Regan told MPs the clerk and his table officers, who help guide the House through its daily proceedings, would count the ballots.

The Kathryn Spirit, a derelict cargo ship sitting abandoned in Lac Saint-Louis on Montreal's South Shore, is now in the process of being dismantled. (Radio-Canada)

Regan told MPs he would only release the final result and not the number of members voting for or against the motion.

Malcolmson, who represents the B.C. riding of Nanaimo—Ladysmith, said Thursday she had consulted widely on the issue and that the death of her bill is "a total denial and dismissal of coastal voices."