Leo Varadkar’s spin machine cost taxpayers more than €100,000 a month since he took office, the Irish Mirror can reveal.

The Taoiseach’s Department spent €1,794,678 on PR, communications and advertising in 17 months.

But in the 15 months before Mr Varadkar’s tenure – when Enda Kenny was in charge – the spend was just €16,200, Freedom of Information figures reveal.

Communications spending included creative services, videos and other content production.

And advertising and media buying included acquiring space in newspapers, online and on radio for consultations, recruitment and information programmes.

(Image: Alex Edelman-Pool/Getty Images)

In total since 2016, €30,750 has been spent on public relations, €531,532 on communications and €1,248,596 on advertising or media buys.

Fianna Fail TD Niall Collins blasted the Taoiseach and said this money should be put towards solving the housing or health crises.

He added: “It’s well known the Taoiseach is obsessed with spin and his own image but this still seems like an awful lot of money.

“I think at a minimum we need more details about where the money went and whether it offered any real return for the taxpayers.

“People are angry at this Government and this Taoiseach’s all-consuming focus on spin and PR. With almost 10,000 people homeless and 516,363 people waiting for a medical appointment, he really needs to put more focus on the substance of his job.”

A spokesman for the Department of the Taoiseach said: “This Government believes it is important to communicate with citizens on how their resources are being allocated and what services the State is providing for them.

(Image: Colm Mahady /Fennells)

“The Government also runs information campaigns aimed at improving citizens’ lives, such as the Healthy Ireland campaign which encourages people to take small steps to improve their health or the Be Safe Online campaign which highlights the range of resources to help support people in being safe online.

“The expenditure referenced relates to a number of major cross-Government public information campaigns that the Department funded centrally during 2018, for example Healthy Ireland, Global Ireland, Project Ireland 2040 the Self Employed Benefits campaign, aimed at ensuring self employed people are aware of the new and existing benefits available to them.

“The majority of this expense was incurred prior to July 2018, before changes were made.

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“Public information campaigns in the future will largely be funded by the relevant line Department, as opposed to being funded centrally from this Department.”