Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I join Senator Mary Moran in congratulating President Higgins on the superb way the UK visit went. It was a great credit to everyone involved in organising it and the contributions they made. It was well done and was a very good sales pitch from an Irish point of view. I had an Adjournment debate last Thursday on people who are self-employed and claiming maternity benefit. Serious discrimination is happening. This morning I received clarification from the Department of Social Protection that if one is unlucky and one's baby is born on 23 April, one cannot use last year's income as the qualifying criterion for receiving maternity benefit, and one is therefore not entitled to claim it. If one's baby is born before 22 April one can use last year's income to calculate one's entitlement to benefits.

We are trying to encourage people to go into business. People who want to run a business from home and have a small income are being discriminated against and this issue must be reviewed. I ask the Leader to invite the Minister here for clarification on this matter because I am not satisfied with the clarification furnished to me. Discrimination is happening. It is wrong that this person who took the risk of setting up a business and who has been paying PRSI for 13 years is told she cannot claim maternity benefit because her baby will be born after 22 April of this year. It is wrong and must be clarified and needs, if necessary, amending legislation to deal with it.