Warning over entitlements lawsuits

Retired farmers who spend the spring months overseas are among those most likely to sue the Department of Agriculture for hundreds of thousands of euro in lost entitlements to single farm payments, says Co Cork auctioneer Liam Mullins.

The Mallow-based estate agent said he believes many elderly farmers are unaware that midnight last night was the deadline for submission of transfer of entitlements forms relating to lands they have leased out.

For the landowner to retain rights to the EU payments, both landowner and lessee had to sign an agreement to terminate lease of entitlements form, countersigned by either a solicitor or a Teagasc adviser.

“I’m being told there is a brigade of retired people out in Spain and Portugal who know nothing about these forms,” said Mr Mullins.

“The department could be sued left, right and centre over this. They should have sent out registered post to make clear to people that this was vitally important, and for the State to be sure that people were informed. Some people have lost thousands of euro over this.”

The department said it did not plan to extend last night’s deadline, which was set by the EU. The department did not receive any approaches from the public on this issue yesterday.

“The need to transfer entitlements by the legal deadline has been notified to the relevant persons in writing and has been the subject of numerous media articles, a press release, PQs, and discussion in the Oireachtas,” said a department spokesperson.

“It was also discussed in some detail at the farmers’ CAP meetings held nationally and is set out in the CAP booklet produced by the department which is also available on the website.”

The new rules govern some 6,417 lease arrangements nationally, according to department figures. Of these, 1,968 leases are thought to be between family members, and were likely to have been easily resolved before deadline.

Mr Mullins says many of the cases he has been told about relate to retired farmers. In recent weeks, he said has been shocked by the number of farmers who were unaware that they were obliged to complete the transfer forms.

Mr Mullins said the Government had helped ease one aspect of the transfer of entitlements by announcing a fortnight ago that the State would not seek the 33% capital gains tax to be paid on these entitlements. However, he said the bigger issue slowing many of the transfers was the difficulty of the two parties agreeing upon a price.

“Some of the leaseholds have risen 2.4 times or 2.7 times in value,” he said.

“A lot of older people leased their farms for seven or 10 years. They signed up for the State’s early farm retirement scheme, and they saw these leases as their pension fund.

“Now they’re told the tenant has first option on the entitlements, which means they can dictate the price at which they sell the leaseback to the landowner.

“The landowner, and probably generations of his family, are the ones who have poured their life into this land. Why should the tenant get first option on these entitlements? There will continue to be a very sour atmosphere between tenants and landlords over this for a long time to come.”