Debated in Parliament on 6 Mar 2024.
Mr Gerald Giam Yean Song asked the Minister for Communications and Information (a) whether the Ministry has a budget for engaging social media influencers; (b) if so, how much is the budget; (c) what are the contents that influencers are engaged to publicise; and (d) how will the success of influencer campaigns be measured.
Sir, the Ministry does not have a budget specifically for engaging social media influencers.
Influencers may be engaged if they can complement our broader communications efforts. We evaluate the effectiveness of our public communications campaigns, but we do not solely track how influencers fare.
Mr Giam.
Sir, I thank the Senior Minister of State for confirming that the Government does engage social media influencers. I have some supplementary questions. First, will the influencers engaged by the Government be required to declare, openly and clearly, within their posts, which agency is sponsoring their posts?
And secondly, will this requirement be extended to social media influencers sponsored by election candidates or their political parties? Specifically, will this fall under the definition of "published by" or "on the candidate's behalf"?
Sir, for the first question that Mr Giam had about whether the social media influencer needs to put up that he is sponsored by someone, can I refer him to my reply to his former colleague, Mr Leon Perera, at the Committee of Supply last year, as well as to his Workers' Party's colleague, Ms He Ting Ru? The answers are in the Hansard.
He was specifically referring to paid partnerships. I told the House that the influencer that he mentioned has also put the "sponsorship" or "paid by" logo. So, that has been answered.
The second question is about whether it applies to election campaigning. I think this is slightly different from the question that he has filed under the Ministry of Communications and Information. My proposal is for Mr Giam to file it with the right Ministry.
PAPERCUTS