PCC may safeguard leased entitlements
However, this issue is still being negotiated with the EU Commission, with Ireland seeking increased flexibility for leased entitlements.
Answering a Dail question by Éamon Ó Cuív, TD, Mr Coveney said difficulty arises where lessors leased out their entire holding and entitlements in 2013 and consequently do not have an automatic “allocation right”. As a consequence, they will neither be eligible to receive entitlements in their own right, nor can they enter into a Private Contract Clause (PCC) to transfer entitlements to the lessee. The value of 100% leased entitlements would be lost to both lessor and lessee, but would remain in the overall fund for redistribution.
If the calculation of 2015 value is based on entitlements “definitively held” in 2014, the value of entitlements leased out in 2014 would be attributed to the lessor. In this scenario the lessor and lessee may enter into a PCC, which would recognise an existing lease agreement and would allow both lessor and lessee to benefit.
However, such a transfer requires that the lessor has an “allocation right” based on receiving a direct payment in 2013, or based on any of the other optional measures which would give rise to an “allocation right“, and that the lessee is an active farmer as defined in article 9 of the Direct Payment Regulation.
