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Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews Has Spent $800,000 On Growing His Facebook Page

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews Has Spent $800,000 On Growing His Facebook Page

Daniel Andrews boasts more followers than Scott Morrison, but that's thanks to taxpayers' money.

Stewart Perrie

Stewart Perrie

Victoria's Premier has reportedly spent a hell of a lot of taxpayer's money building his presence on Facebook.

Politicians all over the world utilise the likes of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and others to get their message out to their followers.

It's a free, easy way to keep citizens up to date with everything that's happening - well, at least people thought it was free.

The Herald Sun reports Daniel Andrews has used $770,000 of the state's coffers since 2014 to increase his page on Facebook. That money is solely spent on Facebook and it's not known how much has been used for other social media sites.

What specifically that money gets spent on is anyone's guess.

There's no denying the system has worked, considering Andrews has more likes on his page than any other state premier and even boasts more supporters than Prime Minister Scott Morrison.

Unsurprisingly, the opposition is furious at the big spend.

Richard Riordan, Shadow Assistant Minister for Scrutiny of Government and Deputy Chair of the Public Accounts and Estimates committee, told News Corp that the Premier should reign it in.

"Daniel Andrews is using Victorian taxpayer dollars as his own credit card to buy likes on Facebook, at the same time he's asking struggling Victorian businesses to repay grants," he said.

"Andrews is boosting his Facebook posts to make him appear more popular.

"Andrews' $770,000 big social media spend simply doesn't pass the pub test when so many Victorians have lost their jobs."

The government has confirmed the spending is a part of the state's much larger marketing and advertising campaign.

According to the parliament's Accounts and Estimates Committee, $158,000 was spent on Facebook between 2019-20, which was the lowest amount since 2016-17.

Featured Image Credit: PA

Topics: Australia