Freedom of Information requests answered in time, UK government
The share of Freedom of Information requests to UK government bodies answered in time – within 20 working days or a permitted extension – for all monitored bodies, departments of state and other monitored bodies, each quarter the Cabinet Office's latest tables give.
Answered in time, all monitored bodies
87.17%
Q2 2026
Verified against source, 4 November 2026, 02:00 UTC- All monitored bodies
- Departments of State
- Other monitored bodies
Source: Cabinet Office. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Data table
13 periods, newest first
| Period | All monitored bodies | Departments of State | Other monitored bodies |
|---|---|---|---|
| Q2 2026 | 87.17% | 86.82% | 87.60% |
| Q1 2026 | 89.13% | 87.97% | 90.60% |
| Q4 2025 | 88.96% | 87.48% | 90.24% |
| Q3 2025 | 90.09% | 86.95% | 93.64% |
| Q2 2025 | 92.14% | 90.22% | 94.02% |
| Q1 2025 | 75.70% | 90.53% | 61.33% |
| Q4 2024 | 77.87% | 89.74% | 66.68% |
| Q3 2024 | 75.17% | 90.48% | 62.28% |
| Q2 2024 | 74.03% | 89.38% | 61.78% |
| Q1 2024 | 76.47% | 87.02% | 65.83% |
| Q4 2023 | 74.04% | 86.83% | 63.10% |
| Q3 2023 | 79.80% | 88.47% | 70.39% |
| Q2 2023 | 82.31% | 90.01% | 72.49% |
Source and licence
- Publisher
- Cabinet Office
- Check it yourself
- https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/freedom-of-information-statistics
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0 – Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Retrieved
- 4 November 2026, 01:56 UTC
- Raw files fetched
- https://www.gov.uk/api/content/government/statistics/freedom-of-information-statistics-april-to-june-2026SHA-256 3b662e6ece16f545bc25de5a30412475f58192b4e87b27b841afb3d44a0f6f4a · 14,394 bytes
- https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6aa2be434e17456e2cdf535a/foi-statistics-q2-2026-statistical-tables.odsSHA-256 fd310603efd444c27c4f682d95f98db0e46aa027283888d7ae2f32db61975e2a · 71,053 bytes
Verification
Verified against source, 4 November 2026, 02:00 UTC Run at 4 November 2026, 02:00 UTC; 39 of 39 figures matched the live source.
| Result | Check | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Pass | Provenance recorded | Cabinet Office; Open Government Licence v3.0; retrieved 2026-11-04T01:56:59Z; 2 raw file(s) |
| Pass | Raw files match recorded SHA-256 | 2 of 2 files intact |
| Pass | Re-parsing raw files reproduces figures | 39 of 39 figures and the headline reproduced |
| Pass | Figures are finite numbers | 39 figures, 0 invalid |
| Pass | Live source matches every figure | 39 of 39 figures match exactly after downloading 2 source file(s) again (2 byte-identical); the headline matches |
| Pass | GOV.UK table is current | latest period 2026 Q2 ended 127 days before retrieval (limit 200), from Freedom of Information statistics: April to June 2026 tables |
| Pass | The release's bulletin agrees | 6 of 6 figures the bulletin https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/freedom-of-information-statistics-april-to-june-2026/freedom-of-information-statistics-april-to-june-2026-bulletin states match, each rounded half up as it rounds them |
| Pass | Table 3a's shares are its counts' | 3 of 3 cases of Table 3a's bodies give (met + extended) ÷ received × 100 as their share in time, which it gives unrounded within 1e-09 (3 exactly) |
| Pass | Table 4a's newest quarter is Table 3a's | 3 of 3 cases of the bodies give Table 3a's share in Table 4a's 2026 Q2 |
| Pass | The release's data adds up to Table 4a | 13 of 13 cases of Table 4a's quarters give, for all monitored bodies, the share in time of the release's data (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6aa2be9b9f95f408139c6637/foi-statistics-q2-2026-published-data.csv) summed over its bodies within 1e-09 (13 exactly) |
| Pass | Source page answers | https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/freedom-of-information-statistics – HTTP 200 |
Notes
- Requests answered within 20 working days, or within a permitted extension (to consider the public interest, for complex environmental information or for archival records), as a share of all requests received less those on hold or lapsed, as Table 4a of the latest release gives it. The Cabinet Office monitors about 40 departments of state and other bodies; earlier quarters are in earlier releases, which the hub does not put together.
- Other monitored bodies answered 61% in time in January to March 2025 and 94% in April to June 2025; the release gives no reason for the change.