FINE GAEL HAS insisted it does not buy Facebook ‘likes’ after a post-Budget Q&A with junior minister Simon Harris attracted over 2,500 ‘likes’, many of them from overseas profiles.

The party faced accusations last night of buying Facebook ‘likes’ in an attempt to boost its profile on the social media website after the post with Harris’s Q&A attracted thousands of ‘likes’ in contrast to many of the others status updates on the page.

Source: Fine Gael via Facebook

A quick scan of those who had ‘liked’ the post showed that many of the profiles appeared to be from overseas and inauthentic users:

This morning the party said that the post had been spammed.

In another post on its Facebook page, the party said that inauthentic users were posting requests for genuine users of the Fine Gael Facebook page to add them as friends.

A spokesperson for the party told TheJournal.ie: “We don’t buy ‘likes’. We don’t know how to buy ‘likes’.”