BUYINGBREXIT
HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF POUNDS ARE BEING SPENT ON POLITICAL FACEBOOK ADS, AND MORE THAN HALF IS GOING ON BREXIT
MORE than a million pounds has been spent on political adverts on Facebook in just five months.
Since 15 October 2018, the Facebook Ad Library has been publishing data on spending on political advertisements.
Across the past five months, £1,289,756 was splashed out on political ads, despite the fact we are not even in the midst of a general election.
More than half that amount (£718,359) was spent on Brexit-related adverts.
The Facebook page that spent the most on adverts was the “People’s Vote UK” page, which is run by Open Britain, a group campaigning for a second Brexit referendum.
Ads from their Facebook page totalled £266,369 over the period.
It’s not just anti-Brexit groups who are using Facebook to try and change opinion, either.
Ads from “Britain’s Future” - a proBrexit page edited by comedy writer Tim Dawson - cost £211,260 over the period.
That was the second-highest amount spent on Facebook advertisements.
In third place was the anti-Brexit “Best For Britain” - which spent £185,470.
Looking only at pages spending more than £2,000 on political advertisements, nearly-two thirds (62 per cent) of the money came from campaign groups trying to influence Brexit one way or another.
A further 16 per cent came from political parties, of which £68,923 was spent on ads from the Conservatives’ main page, £44,621 from the Liberal Democrats’ page, and £38,144 from the Labour Party’s.
A total £126,653 was spent on UK Government and UK Government Scotland Facebook ads over the same period.
The Facebook Ad Library contains adverts about elected officials, candidates for public office and other political issues, such as education or immigration.
Advertiser have to disclose who paid for the ad if it is classed as political.
Despite this, 3,530 ads (worth a total of £158,069) that Facebook had deemed political did not disclose a sponsor. Unlike a normal Facebook post, adverts target messages at people who might not already like a page, therefore increasing its reach. The platform also allows adverts to target people who live in a specific area, or have shown interests in certain topics.