The Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) today announced the appointment of nine Standards Investigation Panellists – the people who will oversee a standards investigation launched at the request of IPSO’s Board to investigate where the regulator has serious concerns about the behaviour or actions of any of its members.

The conditions under which IPSO can launch a standards investigation are laid out in the regulator’s rules and regulations and include where:

• there may have been serious and systemic breaches of the Editors’ Code
• there has been one or more failure or failures to comply with the requirements of the Board
• an annual statement identifies significant issues of concern either in relation to a single incident or a pattern of significant, serial or widespread breaches of the Editors' Code
• statutory authority reports identify substantial Editors' Code compliance issues
• in exceptional circumstances, IPSO reasonably considers that an investigation is desirable because substantial legal issues or Editors’ Code compliance issues are raised.

These appointments follow changes made to the IPSO Regulations in 2016 to allow appointments to be made for panellists before any investigation has been launched, in order to streamline the investigation process.

The successful panellists include a current Northern Ireland Parades Commissioner, a former Detective Chief Superintendent, the Chair of a charity that tackles homelessness and a former Headteacher as well as three individuals with significant and varied national and regional experience of the newspaper industry. The panel for an investigation will be drawn from this pool and will include two independent and one industry panellist.

IPSO’s Head of Standards Charlotte Urwin said:

I am delighted to announce the appointment of these nine panellists. The decision to launch a Standards Investigation is a serious one and would likely arise in response to the identification of serious issues at a particular publisher. I am pleased with the quality of candidates we attracted for this important role and the calibre of those we have appointed.

Notes to Editors

The panellists can be viewed here.

IPSO is the independent press regulation organisation and was set up in September 2014. It regulates most UK national, regional and local newspapers. Media enquiries about IPSO's work may be directed to vikki.julian@ipso.co.uk or via 0300 123 2220.