Accessibility statement | Equality and Human Rights Commission

Using this website

This website is run by the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website.

We are always working to make our website as accessible and usable as possible.

For example, 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 have also tried to make the website text easy 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:

• most older PDF, Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
• the advice and guidance browser uses Javascript and is difficult to navigate using just a keyboard and screen reader software – you can use the site search function instead to find what you are looking for
• some of our online forms are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard and screen reader software – you can contact us using the details below to ask for alternative formats
• the Twitter feed on our homepage is difficult to navigate using just a keyboard and screen reader software – you can visit @ehrc on Twitter to see our tweets
• some of our older videos may not feature captions
• many of our videos are embedded from YouTube and may feature labelling from YouTube itself, which is incorrect or not sufficiently descriptive – you can visit our YouTube channel to see more of our videos
• our interactive infographics are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard and screen reader software:
  • Disability: what does the pay gap look like?
  • Ethnicity: what does the pay gap look like?
  • Gender: what does the pay gap look like?
  • How will tax and welfare reforms affect different groups?
  • Timeline of our achievements

What to do if you can’t 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 – please contact our general enquiries team.

We will consider your request and aim to reply within 20 working days.

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website.

If you find any problems that aren’t listed on this page or think we’re not meeting the requirements of the accessibility regulations, contact the website team:

• using our online feedback form
• email our website team

Enforcement procedure

We (the Equality and Human Rights Commission) are responsible for enforcing the accessibility regulations.

If you are not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

The Equality and Human Rights Commission 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.

Issues with text

Some link text doesn’t make sense when read on its own (for example, ‘read here’).

We are reviewing this content as part of a major redevelopment of the website, which is currently underway and likely to be completed before the end of 2020. As part of the redevelopment work we will set out a schedule for reviewing all of our pages and fixing these links.

When we publish new content we will make sure link text meets accessibility standards.

Issues with PDFs and other documents

Many of our older PDFs, Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents don’t meet accessibility standards. For example, they may not be marked up so they are accessible to a screen reader.

The accessibility regulations don’t require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services. For example, we don’t plan to fix older research reports.

We are reviewing all of our PDFs and documents as part of a major redevelopment of the website, which is currently underway and likely to be completed before the end of 2020. As part of the redevelopment work we will set out a schedule for fixing documents published before 23 September 2018 that are popular or important to our work. For example, popular or important pieces of guidance.

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

Issues with images, video and audio

Some of our older videos may not feature captions.

Many of our videos are embedded from YouTube and may feature labelling from YouTube itself, which is incorrect or not sufficiently descriptive – you can visit our YouTube channel to see more of our videos

Issues with interactive tools and transactions

Some of our interactive forms may be difficult to navigate using a keyboard or screen reader software.

Our forms are built and hosted through third party software and ‘skinned’ to look like our website.

Our interactive infographics are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard and screen reader software:

• Disability: what does the pay gap look like?
• Ethnicity: what does the pay gap look like?
• Gender: what does the pay gap look like?
• How will tax and welfare reforms affect different groups?
• Timeline of our achievements

We do offer alternative formats. If you need information on this website in a different format please contact our general enquiries team.

We are reviewing these pages as part of a major redevelopment of the website, which is currently underway and likely to be completed before the end of 2020. As part of the redevelopment work we will make a decision on whether to keep this content and, if so, how best to present it alongside any alternative formats.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

The issues identified in the Digital Accessibility Centre report (above) have been resolved actively.

Lessons learned from this report are being taken forward as part of a major redevelopment of the website, which is currently underway and likely to be completed before the end of 2020.

The redevelopment work has, at every stage of the process, included user testing with people with a range of accessibility needs.

This includes those with:

• impaired vision
• motor difficulties
• cognitive impairments or learning disabilities
• deafness or impaired hearing

A full, independent accessibility audit will be carried out on the redeveloped website before launch.

This statement was prepared on 4 October 2016. It was last updated on 22 September 2020.