Office rules!

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Can you tell me some common rules on how many breaks you are allowed to take away from your desk during the day in an office job?

I live in England by the way

I live in canada so the rules might be different. But most places assign specific times you can take a break, which is usually 15 minutes around 10 am and then 30 minutes lunch, then another 15 minutes around 3 pm. I'm sure your office will be happy to tell you their rules, if you ask.

By break i mean go to the restroom or a 5 min walk around the office

can you ask a co-worker?
(make sure you ask one who wont go snitching to the boss)

I took four three-minute smoke breaks when I worked and had 45 minutes of lunch break.

There are no set rules, just watch your coworkers.
however, at least once every 45 minutes is healthy, especially in desk jobs, walking around is good for you in those jobs.

I myself usually take a small break every 30-ish minutes (toilet, coffee, fresh air, all of the above)

If you're getting your job done and are productive in general, people won't usually notice when or how often you take a break that's around five minutes. Except if you go out for a smoke: the non-smokers in the office will notice that and possibly complain if they hate smokers.

It depends on company. When I was working in market research organization nobody ever was looking if you come in time and work 9 hours or not - if your job is done prior to dedline you are good worker. Contrary, in the international airport's IT division rules were really strict - total amount of breaks per day couldn't be more than one hour including lunch.
In general don't chose companies which are expected to work without errors - like airports, police, 911, government agencies and so on, any role there an be limited with tons of instructions and rules, even in back office.
I had most positive experience in scientific organizations (not in US though, here they are very different and much less organized), back offices of retail companies and market researchers - style of management was much more liberal. I can't say any company name because not likely it will help you - they are operating mainly in Central Europe and Russia.