The OSR identified significant areas for improvement and issued four key recommendations to enhance the survey’s reliability.
The review comes amid growing concerns that the GSGB, which produces higher gambling participation rates than other official surveys, could be providing an inflated picture of gambling harm that risks driving inappropriate policy responses.
Ben Haden, UKGC director of research and statistics, said: “We welcome the findings from OSR, both the public statement regarding casework they have received in relation to GSGB and their overall review of the GSGB.
“We are pleased they recognise the huge amount of work that the team has put into developing and delivering the largest survey of its kind in the world. We also welcome OSR’s recommendations for further action, which closely align with work that we already have underway.”
Overestimation fears
Central to the controversy is evidence that the GSGB records substantially higher rates of gambling participation and harm than the Health Survey for England (HSE), which has accredited official statistics status.
While the Gambling Commission has attributed this difference to “social desirability bias”, the theory that people underreport gambling when speaking face-to-face with interviewers, critics argue this explanation lacks robust evidence.
Professor Patrick Sturgis, who conducted an independent review of the GSGB in 2024, concluded there was “a non-negligible risk” that the survey “substantially over-states the true level of gambling and gambling harm in the population”.
He called for policymakers to treat the findings “with due caution” until the methodology is better understood.
The OSR found that while this crucial caveat appeared in technical reports, it was not prominently displayed in the main statistical bulletins that most s would read.
“We have judged that more should be done to highlight these limitations within the statistical bulletins themselves,” the watchdog said.
UKGC transparency concerns
The review also raised questions about the survey’s transparency following complaints that the Gambling Commission had not been sufficiently open about potential biases.
Some stakeholders expressed concerns that people who gamble might be more likely to respond to a gambling survey, skewing the results upwards.
Complainants also highlighted that the GSGB figures did not align with other industry data sources, and questioned why this lack of coherence was not properly explained to s.
The OSR agreed that “further work is necessary to explore and explain the level of coherence with other data sources.”Another significant limitation identified was that the Gambling Commission advises against using GSGB results to calculate population-level prevalence of harmful gambling, a restriction that was buried in separate guidance documents rather than clearly stated in the main publications.
The Commission has already begun implementing improvements, including updated guidance published in February and plans for an experimental research project launched in April to test specific methodological aspects.
Results are expected by summer 2025.
Plans are also underway to establish a GSGB Statistics Group, with around 70 stakeholders already expressing interest in ing the forum for dialogue and .
Regulus slam UKGC response
The OSR was careful to clarify that it does not view the issues as breaches of statistical standards, but rather suggested areas where adherence to the Code of Practice for Statistics could be strengthened.
It emphasised that official statistics status does not indicate lower quality than accredited statistics, and that s should choose between surveys based on their specific needs rather than accreditation status alone.
However, the regulator’s intervention highlights growing scrutiny of how gambling harm data is collected and presented, particularly given its potential influence on policy decisions affecting the multi-billion pound industry.
The Commission has committed to providing a fuller update on its improvements by July, with the next annual GSGB report due for publication on 2 October 2025.
Responding to the OSR review, analysts at Regulus Partners, who have historically been vocal in criticising the GSGB, said: “One would be hard-pressed to find any acceptance of [the] criticisms in the Gambling Commission’s statement on the review, which perceives nothing but praise for its endeavours.
“This is not entirely spurious — the OSR finds good and bad in the way that the GSGB has been managed; but the Commission cares little for curate’s eggs. So it is that, criticised by the OSR for downplaying concerns about the GSGB, the Commission downplays the OSR’s own reservations.
“Instructed to remain open to challenge and , the Commission ignores anything in the OSR’s analysis that smacks of censure.
“The OSR review is a golden opportunity for the Gambling Commission to do the right thing — to show that it has listened by acknowledging past missteps. Its initial response is not encouraging.
“It has either misinterpreted the OSR’s review or chosen to misrepresent it — neither of which can foster trust. Those who whitewash criticism are unlikely to learn from it.
“The Commission will respond to the OSR at greater length between now and July. It may not see it at present, but it is in its own best interests to reply with candour next time. Trust depends on openness.”
