Fine Gael has denied that the party purchased Likes on Facebook after a live Q&A blog with Minister of State Simon Harris attracted more Likes than the party’s last 21 posts combined.

Many of the 2600 Likes that the live blog received came from overseas profiles, some of which could not be verified as belonging to real people. You can see the post below:

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_GB/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));

Yesterday, the party came under fire for allegedly buying social media support in order to boost the blog’s presence on Facebook.

Today, Fine Gael’s media department took to its account to explain that Simon Harris’ post had been spammed, warning that the profiles that had liked the Q&A were requesting to become friends with genuine Fine Gael supporters, and that those requests should not be accepted:  

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_GB/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));