Accessibility statement for www.proudtocarewestsussex.com

This website is run by West Sussex County Council. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. That means you should be able to:

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts
  • zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
  • navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
  • navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)

We’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.

AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

How accessible this website is

We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:

  • you cannot modify the line height or spacing of text
  • some of our online forms are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard
  • some of the colour contrast is insufficient
  • most older PDF documents aren’t fully accessible to screen reader software

What to do if you cannot access parts of this website

If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 2 days.

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems that are not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, please contact us by doing the following:

  • Add the website address for the page you’re having problems accessing.
  • Let us know your issue.
  • Proud to Care Team
  • Email: proudtocare@westsussex.gov.uk

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

West Sussex County Council is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

Non accessible content

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.

Non compliance with the accessibility regulations

Form elements are not grouped and missing attributes. This fails WCAG 2.1 AA success criterion 1.3.5 (identify input purpose). We’ll fix this issue by the end of October 2020.

Form labels missing. This fails WCAG 2.1 AA success criterion 1.3.5 (identify input purpose). We’ll aim to fix this issue or provide further details by the end of September 2020

Home page slider has no landmark. This fails WCAG 2.1 A success criterion 1.3.1 (info and relationships). The slider has limited control over the timing of the slides. This fails WCAG 2.1 AA success criterion 2.2.1 (timing adjustable). We’ll aim to fix this issue or provide further details by the end of December 2020.

Disproportionate burden

We believe that the cost required to fix some of the following issues now would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations. We will make another assessment in the future, for example when supplier contracts are up for renewal.

There are some issues we don’t believe need to be fixed now. For example something that may technically be considered an accessibility issue, but is actually unlikely to make it difficult for someone to use the website.

Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

PDFs and other documents

Many of our older PDFs and Word documents do not meet accessibility standards – for example, they may not be structured so they’re accessible to a screen reader. This does not meet WCAG 2.1 success criterion 4.1.2 (name, role value).

Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. By September 2020, we plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.

Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.

How we tested this website

This website was last tested on 17 September 2020. The test was carried out by Bristol City Council – Bristol Design using a range of automated software.

We tested:

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

We are continuously working to resolve all identified accessibility issues which are within our control.

This statement was prepared on 15 September 2019. It was last updated on 18 September 2020.