Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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207. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the amount spent on media monitoring services by her Department; if the role is provided by private contract operators or in-house services; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [27568/20]

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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209. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality if she has engaged a third-party company in each of the years 2017 to 2019 and to date in 2020 to conduct media monitoring and-or provide reports on media coverage of her Department; and if so, the costs of same and the companies engaged. [27664/20]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 207 and 209 together.

The amount spent by my Department on media monitoring and media clipping services for the years 2017, 2018, 2019 and to date in 2020 is set out in the table below.

The Department receives daily National and Regional Press Cuttings from Kantar Media, based on a wide set of key-words and phrases relevant to the work of the Department and the Ministers. Kantar Media was appointed following a national government procurement process managed by the Office of Government Procurement.

Currently, the Department receives an average of between 90 and 110 press cuttings per day, which is reflective of the scope and breadth of the Department’s workload.

Due to the complexity and national focus of the Department’s brief, it was decided in 2019 to seek press cuttings from both regional and national publications, as this is more reflective of the communities we serve. Prior to this only national clippings were received. This accounts for the increase, in 2019 and 2020, of the costs outlined below.

The Department also asked Kantar Media to provide a Campaign Report of the national coverage of the ‘Still Here’ campaign, which was developed and launched in April of this year and provided information and advice to victims of Domestic Violence, particularly during the pandemic. This bespoke report cost €2,460 and is included in the costs below, and it will be used to inform further information / public awareness campaigns that the Department will run in the future.

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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208. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the amount expended on access to online and hard-copy media publications since May 2020 to date; and the breakdown of online and hard-copy subscriptions, including the publications to which her Department subscribes. [27646/20]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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Regular media engagement and monitoring of current media issues is essential for my Department to fulfil its public role and democratic mandate. My Department has hard copy and digital subscriptions to daily and weekend national publications as set out below: