Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Sometimes it is said self-employed persons do not receive any social welfare support. As the Deputy knows, that is not quite true. There is a much longer time period, but where both individuals in a family, for example, are without income support or where somebody has been working in a singular occupation and becomes unemployed, over a period of time many such individuals come into the social welfare system. Obviously, it is a means-tested payment rather than a benefit that they can automatically claim.