John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein)
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241. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the amount spent by her Department on all means of advertising, including the social welfare fraud campaign and campaigns run by her Department in 2017; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [21753/18]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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My Department administers over 70 separate schemes and services, which affect the lives of almost every person in the State. In 2016, some 1.7 million applications for benefits, assistance and access to schemes were received and processed, and over 82 million individual payments were made to people across all age groups and to employers.

The Department is fully committed to ensuring that members of the general public are fully aware of the welfare supports and services that are available to them and notified of any scheme changes which may affect them. The Department’s public information/advertising campaigns span national and regional print media and radio, digital advertising, ‘out of home’ which includes bus, train and Luas, and social media advertising. Advertising is targeted appropriately through the best mix of media to ensure that the Department’s messages effectively reach the target customers.

All advertising expenditure undertaken by the Department is tendered for in accordance with Government and EU procurement guidelines, including use of framework agreements from the Office of Government Procurement.

Details of the campaigns undertaken in 2017 and the total costs of each campaign are set out in the table which follows.