Row over ‘venomous’ slurs amid calls to ‘bin the spin’

Leo Varadkar has conceded the €5m strategic communications unit (SCU) may be gone next year as he accused the opposition of hurling “venomous” slurs at him and his staff over the unit.

There were testy exchanges in the Dáil during continued debate about the SCU which also saw the Taoiseach say he would appear before an Oireachtas Committee and answer questions about the embattled unit.

Questions have arisen over how newspapers were asked by a media company for the SCU to run advertisements which featured Fine Gael politicians and were not clearly labelled as commercial.