Ron Mark: Former Defence Minister expects Court on Inquiry to act quickly on HMNZS Manawanui sinking

A search for answers over the sinking of the HMNZS Manawanui - off Samoa's southern coast.

The $100 million naval ship was running a survey off the area when it hit a reef on Saturday night.

All 75 people onboard were rescued - it caught fire and sank yesterday morning

Former Defence Minister Ron Mark told Ryan Bridge he's gutted as his team fought hard to bring the refurbished ship from Norway in 2019.

He expects the Court of Inquiry to be very quick.

“They’ll want to ascertain exactly how and why the ship ended up in peril and sinking the way it did.”

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So the monum Minui has sunk. Defense Minister Judith Collins
at the press conference yesterday, this could have been a
truly terrible day, but actually it's a bad day. Purchased
in twenty eighteen from Norway, it was used in the
oil and gas industry there. It cost US one hundred
and three million dollars to buy and convert into a

(00:20):
navy ship which was ready for service in twenty nineteen.
The guy who signed the cabinet paper to get that
done was Ron Mark, former Defense Minister. He's with us
live this morning. Ron, Good morning, Good morning Ryan.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
How are you.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
I'm well, thank you. How are you feeling about this?

Speaker 2 (00:34):
No, I'm gutted. Them pretty sad and I guess you
know fair to say this one hurt not just for
me but for my entire fort In my former ministerial
staff team, we worked at butts Off on a range
of cabinet papers at that time and brought into service,

(00:54):
upgraded the frigates. We bought this ship into service. We
completed the project that former government had started with Altro
introduced that vessel into service as well. To lose a
ship that brought such an amazing capability to the Royal
New Zealand Navy into New Zealand as a whole, which
quietly stunned a lot of our five Eyes and other

(01:16):
partners because of its capability and the innovation and thinking
that was behind its purchase. Yeah, lose that ship. We
knew it should be a stopgap for about fifteen minute
fifteen years, not fifteen minutes and fifteen year stopgap to
cover the resolution and the former money were nouing, one
being a survey ship, the other being the dive ship.

(01:39):
We thought it was a very innovative and smart purchase
and get cabinet sign off was a wonderful thing, and
particularly at that time because I'd been left with a
bit of a disaster with the frigate system's upgrade and
project which had gone over one hundred and forty million,
because it had been stalled for ten years, sitting there
waiting for the government, the previous government sign off on it,

(02:01):
and we had to fill find money from somewhere. We've
pulled the money out of the latoral vessel that was
meant to be purchased and put it in to sign
off the evershew and get that done. And then we
bought bought Mono Nui or Eda fond as she was
known back then, and.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
Ay hugely important asset to us. What are you hearing
about what went wrong?

Speaker 2 (02:23):
Well, it's a bit dangerous for me to even repeat
any of the speculation that's out there, because Ryan, as
you know, the Navy will stand up a court of inquiry.
A convenient officer will clearly be the chief of Navy.
He will be looking for people the right expertise. I'd
expect that within forty eight hours there will be an
announcement on that. I'd expect it it'll be very, very quick,

(02:44):
because they want to ascertain exactly how and why the
ship ended up in peril and sinking the way it did.
I guess they'll know that we've got to wait to
hear the results of that court are acquiring. As a
former Minister of Defense, it wouldn't do. You're good to
be speculating in the media and corrupting the process.

Speaker 1 (03:03):
No, fair enough, One quick question on that process. Could
a commanding office a big court martial for something like that?

Speaker 2 (03:10):
I wouldn't even want to spark fair conversation around that,
because all right now, I'd say the commanding of the
skipper will be feeling it really really hardly. Now. One
of the things I do know is that the skipper
made a call, a very tough call, which some might
have thought was a bit premature. But at the end
of the day, everyone got off that vessel. No one died,
and the vessel did go to the bottom, and yet

(03:32):
we showed disadvantage.

Speaker 1 (03:33):
Yeah, well, it just goes to show that it was
the right call in the end, wasn't it. And seventy
five souls are living today to tell the tale. Ron,
thank you very much for that. That's Ron Mark, former
Defense Minister with US. He's signed off on the cabinet
paper to upgrade and bring that in from Norway for
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