Arthur Spring (Kerry North-West Limerick, Labour)
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Question 187: To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if a farmer who has retired under the early retirement scheme (details supplied) is liable to pay any penalties if the transferee refuses to farm the leased land during the term of the agreed lease; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [33811/12]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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One of the conditions of the Early Farm Retirement Scheme is that the transferee is required, for the duration of the pension, to practise farming/forestry/agri-tourism on all the pension lands plus all enlargement lands where relevant, or the equivalent area where re-parcelling has taken place. Failure to fulfil that condition will result in my Department imposing a penalty on the transferee, not the retired farmer, for the period of non-compliance.

Where it is not possible for an approved transferee to continue to comply with the conditions of the Scheme, the pension lands may be leased to another eligible transferee for the remaining period of the pension or for five years, whichever is the greater. However, in the event of the lands not being leased to another eligible transferee within five years of the commencement date of the pension, the pension will cease, and payments already made will have to be refunded to the Department. If the first five years of the contract have been fulfilled however and the lands are not leased to another eligible transferee, then the pension will cease but pension payments already received may be retained.