> e-Petition on government website accessibility
- 7 Feb 07, 01:36 PM
There is an e-petition calling for new government websites to provide higher levels of accessibility on the 10 Downing Street e-petition website. Should we all sign it?
I've been aware of the e-petition for some time and I've wrestled with whether to sign it ever since. On the face of it, it looks like a good idea. Why shouldn't new Government websites offer the highest levels of accessibility? It might also generate some publicity, and who knows which government official's desk it might land on?
The e-petition came about after Bruce Lawson and Dan Champion found that following a £200,000 re-fit, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) website failed to offer basic levels of accessibility. A move to make government websites more accessible then, is surely to be welcomed. Isn't it?
The thing is, there are already guidelines to make government websites accessible. Whilst the levels of accessibility proposed in the e-petition are higher than those required by government standards - the higher level is still seen as the preferred goal for government websites to achieve. So, for instance, whilst a new government website isn't compelled to make it possible to change the size of text, that should still be the goal.
The DTI website - presumably - failed to meet government guidelines when it was re-launched, and as such, steps should and are being taken to improve accessibility. Would setting the bar higher have made a difference in this example?
I'm not saying that government websites are perfect - they aren't. But on the whole they are more accessible than most commercial websites. And U.K. government websites are generally more accessible than those of their European counterparts. I sometimes think we can be too quick to judge, and too slow to encourage.
Having written this blog, I'm still no wiser as to whether to sign it. Please feel free to use the comments to make a case to persuade me one way or the other!
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My main comment about signing this petition, or any attempt to make the WCAG normative is that they are open to interpretation, and shouldn't stand as legal standards.
I'm all for higher levels of accessibility and face these battles every working day, but the possibility of being penalised for creating accessible websites that might not conform on debatable parts of the WCAG.
The other concern is that you can happily conform to the letter of the WCAG, but have a completely inaccessible or unusable site.
The DDAs spirit of allowing access where possible should take precedence over techniques and guidelines that are there to help developers make websites accessible, not as enforceable rules.
I've outlined more on signing the accessibility e-petition on my blog.
Complain about this post
My main comment about signing this petition, or any attempt to make the WCAG normative is that they are open to interpretation, and shouldn't stand as legal standards.
I'm all for higher levels of accessibility and face these battles every working day, but the possibility of being penalised for creating accessible websites that might not conform on debatable parts of the WCAG.
The other concern is that you can happily conform to the letter of the WCAG, but have a completely inaccessible or unusable site.
The DDAs spirit of allowing access where possible should take precedence over techniques and guidelines that are there to help developers make websites accessible, not as enforceable rules.
I've outlined more on signing the accessibility e-petition on my blog.
Complain about this post