The Impress Standards Code was developed with and for the public. It was written by the Impress Code Committee after a rigorous and transparent consultation process. This was the first time in the history of UK press regulation that the British public were directly asked to contribute to the development of press standards.

Submissions to Code Consultation
One of the stages of the consultation was a formal six-week public consultation on a draft Code. Impress published this draft Code on 19 August 2016, inviting submissions. The consultation period ran for a period of 6 weeks, ending on 29 September 2016. Impress published a consultation paper explaining the reasons for the consultation and the thinking behind the draft Code. The consultation paper asked stakeholders to answer key questions that would assist the committee in finalising the Code.

Impress received 42 submissions, eight of which were from stakeholders who requested that their submissions be anonymised. Stakeholders were able to make submissions in several ways: through an online survey, by email, or by phone. Many stakeholders responded through the online survey.