New Expropriation Regime for Public Works to Last Until the End of 2022

26 February 2021 – Ana Custódio

Portugal’s Council of Ministers approved the decree-law creating a special regime for expropriation and the constitution of administrative easements to implement projects included in the Economic and Social Stabilisation Programme. The regulations entered into force on Wednesday and will remain in place until December 31, 2022.

The new law states that “Considering the impact on every area [of the economy] by the lockdown imposed by the need to mitigate and combat the pandemic COVID-19, in particular on the economic, financial and social side, it is imperative to promote the gradual resumption of social and economic life through the adoption of measures aimed at boosting the Portuguese economy and actions that promote the implementation of lasting and necessary investments, with tangible benefits for people and that constitute a way of maintaining or creating jobs across the national territory.”

While on the one hand, there is an urgent need to fund investments to strengthen the Portuguese economy and finances, on the other hand, the existence of constraints on the expropriation process and the constitution of administrative easements have led to the need to create a special regime to streamline such procedures within the framework of the investments foreseen in the PEES, in the various areas of intervention.

Thus, the new decree-law established a special regime that seeks to streamline the Economic and Social Stabilisation Programme’s implementation, introducing simplicity and celerity in the processing of expropriation and administrative easement procedures needed to implement the Programme. Therefore it sets up a special regime covering expropriation and the creation of administrative easements with a view to the implementation of interventions that are considered, by order of the member of the Government responsible for the sector of activity over which the intervention in question falls, to fall within the scope of the PEES.

Therefore, the expropriation of property and the rights inherent required for the construction, expansion, rehabilitation or improvement of equipment, networks and infrastructure within the scope of the execution of the investments considered of public utility and as a matter of urgency.

According to the decree-law, “it is the expropriating entity’s responsibility, without prejudice to the State or local government’s own areas of competence, to promote and develop the processes inherent to the expropriation procedure per this decree-law and the Expropriation Code, in the applicable part, expropriating entity being responsible for the deposit of the amount or the bond referred to in article 20 of the Expropriation Code, as well as for the payment of fair compensation.”

Translation: Richard Turner