More than £one.1 million has been spent in the last 4 years by the Department of Work and Pensions to try to increase their search engine rankings, the government minister has confessed.

Work and Pensions Minister, Chris Grayling, detailed the spending in a parliamentary written answer, that showed that the highest costs were incurred in 2009-10, when £956,000 was documented as having been spent on search engine biasing.

The rise in spending has been exceptional in the last four years, with only £five,100 spent in 2006-07, falling to even less – just £2,500 – in 2007-08. The staggering rise began in 2008-09, however, which saw £176,000 spent on the online marketing techniques.

Mr Grayling pointed out that the figures included money spent on 'pay per click' and 'paid for' search terms. The work has been carried out by the department's in-house communications teams. He said that extracting individual figures for Google and other search engine providers would result in a "disproportionate" cost.

"The current cross-government policy of freezing all paid for marketing and advertising has suspended spend on this type of paid for search term until further notice," he added.

He also said that the department is working with the Cabinet Office to find a standardised method for quantifying website costs across the departmental agencies and associated public bodies.

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