Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 15 October 2024

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade, and Defence

Report of the Commission on the Defence Forces: Engagement with Chair of Implementation Oversight Group

3:10 pm

Mr. Eamonn Murtagh:

On the subsea domain, which is obviously an important area, as was rightly outlined, two projects are under way. First, we are in the middle of a procurement process for a multi-beam sonar system for the P60 class of vessels. That is very well advanced. It is currently at tender evaluation stage of a public procurement competition. Detailed negotiations are ongoing. All due diligence will be done before we award a contract, but it is very well progressed.

The second area relates to the civil military working group we established to develop a suite of subsea awareness capabilities. We have been working on that for the past 12 to 18 months. That work is coming to its conclusion. I do not want to say too much about it, but we are nearing clear recommendations on what kind of subsea capability we need to develop and implement in the coming years.