Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much her Department has spent on advertising on social media in each month since January 2016.

The government has a duty to provide the public with information and to ensure the effective running and uptake of public services. Social media offers a cost effective and targeted communication tool to achieve this.

The majority of social media spend over the last 18 months has been in support of teacher recruitment. Since September 2016 (when the new teacher recruitment campaign launched), social media advertising has generated 19,000 registrations of interest in teaching. We have also used social media to support uptake of 30 hours free childcare and to encourage the reporting of child abuse.

Each month the department publishes spend over £25,000 on gov.uk. Below we have summarised the spend on social media.