A handover control method in a mobile communication system that performs handover control by switching base stations that communicate with a mobile terminal as the mobile terminal moves. In this handover control method, a mobile control device selects one or more handover base station candidates based on the communication state, and based on the communication capabilities of the handover base station candidates, decides a transmission rate for multicasting communication data, and transmits communication data to each of the handover base station candidates at the decided transmission rate, and a handover base station candidate that is decided as a handover base station sends the saved multicast communication data to the mobile terminal.