Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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26. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the amount spent by his Department on traditional and online advertising in each of the past ten years and to date in 2024, in tabular form. [41805/24]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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My Department uses advertising to promote a range of services, supports and initiatives for people and communities across Ireland.

As the media landscape has evolved over the past number of years, advertising expenditure has grown to address the diverse needs of different audiences, including costs associated with achieving national reach for important public messages. For example, my Department has run a significant national campaign on reducing energy use in 2022, 2023 and 2024. This “reduce your use” campaign was designed to assist every household in Ireland in dealing with rising energy costs and supporting positive behaviour change. In recent years, advertising expenditure has also grown to ensure that we are meeting our Irish language advertising requirements under the Official Languages (Amendment) Act 2021.

My Department utilises both digital and traditional media, recognising that traditional media is an integral part of Ireland’s communications landscape and a crucial tool for us to connect with communities and regional audiences across Ireland.

The majority of Department advertising is procured via a media buying agency, and the weighting assigned to digital or traditional media is determined by target audience, best practice and securing value for money.

The table below sets out overall digital and traditional advertising expenditure in my Department since 2019. It is not possible to identify expenditure on advertising prior to 2019 due to restructuring of the Department.