It is a requirement of the EU regulations governing both the 1994 and the current schemes of early retirement from farming that the early retirement pension can be paid only as a supplement to any national retirement pension that is payable. This means that the amount of national retirement pension payable to a participant, and to his or her spouse or partner in a joint management arrangement, must be deducted from the early retirement pension.
On entering the early retirement scheme, participants undertake to cease commercial farming definitively. Even in a case where payment may have ceased because the amount of the national retirement pension is greater than the early retirement pension, the participant may not resume farming. Farming transferees, too, undertake to practise farming as a main occupation and work the expanded holding for as long as the pension is granted to the retiring farmer, and they must continue to comply with their undertakings regardless of whether the pension continues to be paid.
These undertakings are clearly set out in the scheme documentation and are in compliance with EU regulations, and my Department has no authority to vary them.