Web Accessibility And The Law In The UK: Is Your Website Legal?

There has been widespread speculation about the new legislation that is being introduced, which will ensure that websites are accessible to disabled users. Trenton Moss, Managing Director of Webcredible (http://www.webcredible.co.uk), a web accessibility and usability consultant, says, "No seems to know what these new law require you to do. Try to find specific information about the requirements on the Internet and chances are you'll come up empty handed."

He has a point. The RNIB (Royal National Institute for the Blind) and the DRC (Disability Rights Commission), two of the most renowned advocates for creating accessible websites, have no specific information about the laws and what websites specifically need to do in order to meet the legal requirements.

So, what does the law state? Part III of the Disability Discrimination Act refers to the provision of goods, facilities and services. The Code of Practice, which specifically mentions websites, can be downloaded in its entirety from the DRC website (http://www.drc.org.uk/open4all/law/Code%20of%20Practice.pdf 676kb).

The relevant quotes from this 175-page document are:

2.2 (p7): "The Act makes it unlawful for a service provider to discriminate against a disabled person by refusing to provide any service which it provides to members of the public."

4.7 (p39): "From 1st October 1999 a service provider has had to take reasonable steps to change a practice which makes it unreasonably difficult for disabled people to make use of its services."

2.13 - 2.17 (p11-13): "What services are affected by the Act? An airline company provides a flight reservation and booking service to the public on its website. This is a provision of a service and is subject to the act."

5.23 (p71): "For people with visual impairments, the range of auxiliary aids or services which it might be reasonable to provide to ensure that services are accessible might include ... accessible websites."

5.26 (p68): "For people with hearing disabilities, the range of auxiliary aids or services which it might be reasonable to provide to ensure that services are accessible might include ... accessible websites."

"One of the biggest myths about the law," continues Mr. Moss, "is that the new laws will be implemented in October of this year, when the final part of the Act comes into force." This final piece of legislation actually refers to service providers having to consider making permanent physical adjustments to their premises and is not related to the Internet in any way. (http://www.disability.gov.uk/dda/#part3).

The law about accessible websites came into force on 1st October 1999 (http://www.drc.org.uk/open4all/law/code.asp) and the Code of Practice for this section of the Act was published on 27th May 2002 (http://www.hmso.gov.uk/si/si2002/20020720.htm). This means that the majority of websites are already in breach of the law.

So, can you be sued if your website fails to meet the required standards? "Probably," says Mr. Moss. The RNIB claim that they have considered taking up a number of cases against organisations with regard to their websites. When they raised the accessibility issues of the website, companies have typically made the necessary changes, rather than facing the prospect of legal action.

The DRC has launched a formal investigation into 1000 websites and expect to publish their findings some time this year. (http://www.drc-gb.org/annualreview/foreword/index.asp#internet). If your website is on this list then you will have to start thinking about making it accessible to all web users in the very near future.

So what does your website need to do to comply to the standards? It is widely believed that if, or perhaps more appropriately when, a case makes it to court that the W3C accessibility guidelines will be used to assess a website's accessibility and ultimately decide the outcome of the case. The W3C is the Internet governing body and its web accessibility guidelines can be found at http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/full-checklist.html. To further complicate matters, the W3C offers three different levels of compliance; it will most likely be the Priority 2 guidelines, (which must be satisfied according to the W3C) that will probably need to be adhered to.