Despite a week of controversy that brought him a lot of criticism, businessman Peter Casey has announced that he will continue to run in the presidential election.

Earlier this week, the former Dragons’ Den star was facing calls to drop out of the presidential race after stating that recognising Travellers as an ethnic group was ‘nonsense’ and they were ‘camping’ on land they didn’t own.

Despite the uproar, today’s opinion polls show that support for the 61-year-old has doubled to 2pc.

In an article today in the Sunday Independent, Casey says he is now ‘more determined than ever to remain in the race’ after receiving a wave of support.

He is refusing to apologise for any previous statements about Travellers, because he believes they are ‘first and foremost’ Irish citizens. He continues on before attacking the country as a ‘welfare-dependent state’.

Welfare has led, he says, to a ‘sense of entitlement that’s become unaffordable’.

The businessman says: ‘We have become a nation of people who expect, no demand, that the State looks after them. Pay all of their bills, provide them with homes, provide all sorts of social benefits.’

He previously took issue with a social ‘four-bedroom’ house being refused by a Traveller family in Tipperary because they ‘they weren’t being given stables with them’.

‘I’ve been on the road a lot and I’ve been getting soundbites but they turned down houses because they didn’t have stables. I mean, that’s, where are we going to with this? It’s just nonsense’, Casey previously said on the matter.

It was previously rumored that it could be Peter Casey pulling out of the race after he tweeted that he was ‘taking the weekend off’ from his campaign to consider his future.