Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Will the Taoiseach outline for the House the number of staff in his Department who cover social media, contributions, advertising, putting up posts, video messaging and so on? Is this done by Government Information Service, GIS, staff or is it a mixture of GIS staff and political staff? Who co-ordinates all of that? Is there a difference between promoting Government campaigns and personal messages from the Taoiseach, or are they treated the same? It is interesting that the Taoiseach's twitter handle is still @campaignforleo, which really is a political slogan. Has the Taoiseach plans to change that with regard to the office of An Taoiseach?

I shall now turn to the issue of the spending. There has been a considerable spend and I would appreciate if the Taoiseach could confirm whether the figure quoted in The Irish Mirroris correct. It is a substantial amount. I also noted another figure, which was the cost to produce the campaign video for Ireland to win a seat on the UN Security Council. It is reported to have cost €100,000. I watched that video. It is a fine video and it is well produced but having been a Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, I realised that the campaign for the UN Security Council is a close-up campaign. I do not say it is hand-to-hand combat but the Taoiseach will be aware that it is about personally engaging with representatives from other countries. Our officials do it and our Ministers do it whenever they are overseas. When I watched the video, it looked like it was intended for a domestic audience and not one that was likely to encourage anybody on the UN Security Council to vote Ireland onto the council. Rather it was a video that made everyone look good, including the Taoiseach, for a domestic audience. I believe there is a serious issue in respect of the emphasis placed on public relations and the proliferation of videos with the ensuing costs. We need better transparency on this. Perhaps the Taoiseach would confirm whether that €100,000 figure quoted in the media is true.

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