Hon Mark Burton
20 September 2002

Project Protector Registrations-of-Interest close

Twenty-one organisations from the worldwide ship building industry responded to the Invitation-to-Register-Interest for the supply of new RNZN ships under the project title of Project Protector, the Minister of Defence, Mark Burton announced today. “There are 14 countries represented in the 21 registrations”, Mr Burton said.

“The Ministry of Defence now has the task of reviewing the registrations, prior to shortlisting a smaller number of suitably qualified organisations that will be invited to provide fully developed proposals.

“This is an important capability for the New Zealand Defence Forces and the civil agencies that will be able to access that capability. With the ships being purchased for Project Protector, the Navy will be able to patrol more effectively our EEZ, and to work more effectively with other agencies, such as Customs and Fisheries, in their task of protecting our borders”, Mr Burton said.

Unlike other projects, the Protector Invitation-to-Register-Interest identified critical functions that need to be performed by the Protector fleet and the budget constraints being applied to the project. Respondents were encouraged to suggest the ship types that they could provide to meet the needs of New Zealand. This additional requirement applies an additional level of complexity to the evaluation of the responses. Mr Burton confirmed the outcome of this stage is expected to be complete before the end of the year.

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