Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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1069. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the budget and spend in her Department for marketing, media and social media in each of the years 2016 to 2018, inclusive; the projected spend for 2019; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [54463/18]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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For the purpose of this response, I interpret the "spend in her Department for marketing and media and social media” as media buying costs incurred from public information campaigns across all media, senior management vacancy notices, and other announcements. The budget figure listed for each year is the total budget allocation for customer communications and advertising.

My Department is committed to ensuring that members of the public are aware of the welfare supports and services that are available to them and that they are notified of any scheme changes which may affect them. Public information campaigns are targeted carefully, using the best mix of media formats, to ensure that the Department’s messages reach members of the public effectively.

The Department’s public information campaigns span national and regional print media, radio, outdoor formats, and social media and digital advertising channels. Expenditure on these channels will vary from year to year depending on the range and number of new initiatives or required messaging. As such, it is not possible to supply a figure for projected spend in 2019.

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.

Total advertising expenditure in 2016, 2017 and 2018 are set out in the following table.