E-Petition Statistics: The Invisible Majority

UK Parliament e-petitions 2010–2026 — ghost/invisible petitions calculated from API ID-sequence gaps

Key Figures

65,501 Total published petitions
(2010–2024)
172,809 Total archived petitions
(published + rejected, 2010–2024)
491,286 Total ghost/invisible petitions
(2010–2024, minimum confirmed) + Parliament 5 pending
74% Ghost fraction of all IDs
(Parliaments 2–4 verified)
86% (2019–2024) Highest ghost rate
by parliamentary session

Methodology: Ghost/invisible figures are calculated from ID sequence gaps in the petition.parliament.uk public API — IDs in the sequential range that never appeared in any public state (published, rejected, or otherwise). All 172,808 petition IDs across Parliaments 2–4 (2010–2024) have been verified. Parliament 5 (2024–2026) is not yet crawled. The 2015–16 and 2016–17 session figures are split proportionally from Parliament 1's total of 69,560 ghost IDs (by session petition volume: 73.2% / 26.8%).

Charts

Published, archived, and ghost/invisible petitions (linear scale)
Y-axis: 0–400,000 petitions. Proportional x-axis by parliamentary date.
0 50k 100k 150k 200k 250k 300k 350k 400k number of petitions parliamentary session 2010–2015 2015–2016 2016–2017 2017–2019 2019–2024 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020 2022 2024 2026 2010–2015: 32,873 published | 60,945 archive | 35,383 ghost | 96,328 true total 2015–2016: 6,121 published | 23,232 archive | 50,918 ghost | 74,150 true total 2016–2017: 4,602 published | 8,499 archive | 18,642 ghost | 27,141 true total 2017–2019: 8,152 published | 28,100 archive | 59,619 ghost | 87,719 true total 2019–2024: 13,753 published | 52,033 archive | 326,724 ghost | 378,757 true total 2010–2015: 32,873 published | 60,945 archive | 35,383 ghost | 96,328 true total 2015–2016: 6,121 published | 23,232 archive | 50,918 ghost | 74,150 true total 2016–2017: 4,602 published | 8,499 archive | 18,642 ghost | 27,141 true total 2017–2019: 8,152 published | 28,100 archive | 59,619 ghost | 87,719 true total 2019–2024: 13,753 published | 52,033 archive | 326,724 ghost | 378,757 true total 2010–2015: 32,873 published | 60,945 archive | 35,383 ghost | 96,328 true total 2015–2016: 6,121 published | 23,232 archive | 50,918 ghost | 74,150 true total 2016–2017: 4,602 published | 8,499 archive | 18,642 ghost | 27,141 true total 2017–2019: 8,152 published | 28,100 archive | 59,619 ghost | 87,719 true total 2019–2024: 13,753 published | 52,033 archive | 326,724 ghost | 378,757 true total ⚡ SNAP2016–17: Snap election dissolution — Parliament abruptly dissolved 3 May 2017. All active petitions instantly closed. Session cut short by ~1 month. 2024–2026: Data pending (crawler not yet run) (data pending)
Published petitions All petitions (incl. rejected) True total (incl. ghost/invisible)

Session Data

Session Published Rejected Ghost/Invisible † True Total
2010–2015 32,873 28,072 35,383 † 96,328
2015–2016 6,121 17,111 50,918 †‡ 74,150
2016–2017 4,602 3,897 18,642 †‡ 27,141
2017–2019 8,152 19,948 59,619 † 87,719
2019–2024 13,753 38,280 326,724 † 378,757
2024–2026 — — pending —
Total (2010–2024) 65,501 107,308 491,286 † 664,095

† Ghost/Invisible: Calculated from ID sequence gaps in the petition.parliament.uk public API — IDs in the sequential range that never appeared in any public state (published, rejected, or otherwise). All 172,808 petition IDs across Parliaments 2–4 verified via full sequential crawl.
‡ Parliament 1 (2015–2017) total ghost = 69,560 IDs. Split proportionally by session petition volume: 2015–16 (23,232/31,730 = 73.2% → 50,918) and 2016–17 (8,499/31,730 = 26.8% → 18,642). These sub-session figures are estimates within a verified parliament-level total.
Parliament 5 (2024–2026) ghost count not yet determined (crawler pending).