Sinn Féin has received more than €5 million in State funding and private donations since 2011 but also strengthens its operation through TDs and Senators using a portion of their wages to hire extra staff.

The party’s representatives in the Oireachtas take the average industrial wage, with the remainder used to hire extra staff and divert funds back to the central party.

No official in Sinn Féin, including TDs and Senators, is paid more than €47,000. A TD’s salary is €87,258 and a Senator is paid €65,000.

Sinn Féin employs substantially more staff than its rivals despite having the smallest representation in the Dáil and Seanad of the four main parties.

When The Irish Times reported on the staffing of the main parties last summer, Sinn Féin directly employed 61 people in its party headquarters and in Leinster House.

Parnell Square HQ

The party has 14 TDs and three Senators, compared with 34 TDs and Senators for the next smallest party, Fianna Fáil, but it employed 25 more people centrally. Sinn Féin has said 41 of those people worked in its Parnell Square headquarters and in Leinster House, while 20 work in “other capacities”.

The party with the next highest number of employees was Fine Gael with 38. Labour employed 27 centrally, while Fianna Fáil had 34.5 jobs in total.

However, all parties are likely to have increased staffing levels since then as preparations for next year’s election intensify. Party sources claimed the higher staffing levels reflected Sinn Féin rules on salaries.

The two large elements of State funding received by Sinn Féin come from the party leader’s allowance, given to all parties, as well as Independent deputies, and money for general administration of activities of parties with more than 2 per cent support.

The party leader’s allowance is based on the size of the party in the Oireachtas, with Fine Gael getting the largest share of about €2.7 million a year.

Independent TDs are entitled to this allowance, with a non-party TD getting €41,152 and an Independent Senator €23,383.

In the case of Sinn Féin, it received a total of €3,102,529 from the leader’s allowance since 2011, comprised of €933,875 in 2011, €1,084,354 in 2012 and €1,084,000 in 2013.

The second, general administration allowance, comprises €5 million annually and is allotted according to a party’s electoral strength.

Sinn Féin received €2,125,456 in this category since 2011: €720,000 in 2013, €719,919 in 2012 and €685,537 in 2011.

Sipo records

Records for this State funding are kept with the Standards in Public Office Commission (Sipo) and details for 2014 have yet to be published.

The party also received some private donations in recent years but the amounts are nowhere near as substantial as the State funding. Changes to funding for political parties introduced by the Government reduced the amount of donations a party can accept from €6,348 to €2,500, and any company giving a corporate donation of more than €200 has to be registered with Sipo.

In 2011, a general election year before the new rules came into force, the party's Dublin South Central TD, Aengus Ó Snodaigh, gave the party €6,000, as did Kerry deputy Martin Ferris.

Mr Ó Snodaigh donated another €6,000 in 2012, and €21,084 was received from nine people in 2013 – an average of €2,342 each – after the new rules came into effect.

There have also been donations to individual TDs, which were unsurprisingly at their highest in 2011, when six deputies received €8,650. Mary Lou McDonald received the highest amount, €4,000, with Mr Ó Snodaigh the lowest on €150.

Ms McDonald was the only deputy to receive a donation, €1,000, in 2012 while no donations were received in 2013.