Standards of Compliance

We have designed this website following these accessibility guidelines:

• We make sure that navigation throughout the site works in a consistent way
• We use a standard web font to make it easy for all to read. In most cases, the size of the font can be adjusted according to the user's needs, using standard browser and operating system options
• All images are given 'alt text' alternatives except those which are only decorative. The 'alt text' for these are left blank
• We never use colour as the only way to convey information

Other Navigation Aids

The main navigation links allow users to reach subpages quicker in graphical browsers. The navigation is still entirely usable in text-only and non-javascript browsers.

Links

Wherever possible, links are written to make sense out of context. All links can be followed in any browser, even if scripting is turned off. There are no links that open new windows without warning. Title tags are used to show links will open new windows and go to other sites. JAWS screenreader users can change their settings to make sure these can be read.

Images

All relevant content images used include descriptive alternate text (alt) attributes. Some images contain no informational value as they are purely decorative. In these cases 'NULL' alt text is used, or the image is presented as a background image.

Visual Design

This site uses cascading style sheets for most of its visual layout. If your browser or browsing device does not support stylesheets at all, the content of each page is still readable. This site uses only relative font sizes, compatible with the user-specified text size option in visual browsers.

Accesskeys

Accesskeys have not been used - this is a deliberate omission as the benefits from their use is highly limited and they can cause problems due to conflict with other software using shortcuts.

PDF Documents

To read PDF documents you will need Adobe reader software. A link to download Adobe reader is available on each page that contains a PDF, or you can use the link below.

Download Adobe reader

All our PDFs are currently made using Adobe 5 software. We are currently looking to upgrade this software so that our PDFs have more accessibility features. In the meantime, please use the accessibility tools provided by Adobe to help you read PDF content. Find out more about Adobe Accessibility tools.

If you have any comments on the accessibility of the site please contact us.