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Release practice policy

As part of our commitment to transparency and public accountability, this policy sets out our approach to the orderly release of statistics. It covers the operational processes for releasing official statistics, including the arrangements for giving officials pre-release access to official statistics prior to publication. These arrangements are designed to maintain public confidence in the integrity of official statistics while allowing officials to respond to questions and to comment or act on statistics covering policy areas for which they are democratically responsible.

We publish statistics in a variety of formats:

  • written reports
  • excel data tables
  • raw data deposited in the UK Data Service (opens in new tab) for Gambling Survey for Great Britain (GSGB) and Young People and Gambling
  • interactive statistics dashboard for user friendly visual data overviews.

Release process

We pre-announce the publication of statistics up to 12 months in advance in our Annual statistical work programme. Provisional release dates outline a 1 or 2 month expected release window. We will then give a specific release date and time at least 4 weeks ahead of publication, wherever possible.

Statistics publications are released on a timely basis to deliver value to our statistics users, whilst ensuring quality. Publication dates are only changed with approval from the Head of Statistics, and for a limited number of reasons, such as significant delays with data processing or data quality issues. We will communicate these changes via our release calendar. We will always provide a reason when changing a confirmed and specific date.

Statistics are published at 9:30am on a weekday. If an alternative release time is ever required, we will seek agreement from the Director General at the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) and communicate this via our release calendar.

Pre-release access

The phrase ‘pre-release access’ refers to the practice of making official statistics in their final form, and any accompanying written commentary, available to an eligible person in advance of their publication. Pre-release access is only granted where the public benefit is assessed to outweigh the detriment to public trust, as assessed by the Head of Statistics. The period of access is restricted to a maximum of 24 hours before their public release at 9:30am on the following day.

The rules and principles that govern pre-release access are specified within the Pre-release Access to Official Statistics Order 2008 (opens in new tab). These arrangements are designed to ensure that such access is justified, limited, controlled, publicised and complies with statutory requirements. Their purpose is to balance the public interest in trust in official statistics with that of enabling those with policy responsibility to act, answer questions, and provide responses at, or shortly after, the time statistics are published.

The number of people who have access is kept to a minimum. Where pre-release access to our statistics has been granted, a list of those individuals who receive access will be provided within the ‘statistical release’ page for that particular release.

General principle to pre-release

In relation to official statistics, pre-release access is strictly limited. In general, the following are allowed to have pre-release access:

  • a person who is accountable to the public for the formulation of policy or the delivery of a service to which the statistic has direct relevance
  • a person who needs access to advise someone who is eligible for the first reason
  • those who provide administrative support to the previous people.

Before anyone is granted pre-release access, we ensure that they fully understand and agree to the pre-release principles. We include guidance on pre-release access as a reminder with each statistics release.

Only those directly involved in the production and quality assurance of the statistics, or those who require the data for operational purposes, will be able to access statistics before the pre-release period begins.

Breach of conditions of release

In the event of a breach of the principles and rules set out in the legislation and described in this statement, the Head of Statistics will assess whether to notify the National Statistician and the OSR. The OSR (opens in new tab) may subsequently investigate in conjunction with the Head of Statistics, depending on the severity and risk the breach posed to the public trust of statistics.

Either way, we will keep an internal record and take action to prevent a recurrence.

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Last updated: 5 November 2026

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