Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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427. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the status of the tender for the Coast Guard search and rescue operations; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [21025/22]

Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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On 20 December 2021, the first stage of the procurement process for the Irish Coast Guard Aviation Services contract commenced, with the publication on eTenders and in the Official Journal of the European Union of a Pre-Qualification Questionnaire (PQQ) and a Response Document for Candidates to complete.

On 25 January 2022 the Government, decided to include, as part of the Pre-Qualification Questionnaire, clarifications and additional information specifying the four bases provided for in the original contract i.e. Dublin, Shannon. Sligo and Waterford; and an amended closing date of February 11^th2022 was provided.

The PQQ Evaluation Process is reaching a conclusion and Candidates will be notified of the outcome in the coming weeks.  Shortly thereafter, Stage 2 of the procurement process will commence, when a Request for Tenders (RFT) will issue to those Candidates, which, at PQQ Stage of the Competition, were determined to have the technical capability, and economic and financial standing to perform the contract.  

After the assessment of the tender responses, EU and Irish procurement legislation allows for either the award of the contract to the Tenderer that has submitted the most economically advantageous tender for the provision of the Services based on the award criteria set out in the RFT without negotiation, or alternatively, tenderers can be invited to a negotiation phase. This will be determined once RFT responses are received and assessed.

The entire process is being conducted in accordance with ‘Competitive Procedure with Negotiation’ (CPN) under the European Union (Award of Public Authority Contracts) Regulation 2016 (S.I. 284 of 2016).