New accessibility regulations for University websites

24 Nov 2020

You may need to make changes to your website or web content to meet new government regulations on accessibility

A new set of accessibility regulations came into force in September 2020. They require public sector bodies like universities to ensure their websites meet international accessibility standards (WCAG 2.1 AA), and to publish an accessibility statement explaining how accessible their websites are. These same requirements apply to mobile applications.

The University is committed to making sure its websites and applications work for everyone. Over the past year, web and digital teams across the University, both in central Directorates and in Faculties, have been reviewing the accessibility of their websites, improving website templates, and adding links to a new Accessibility Statement. This work will take us a long way towards meeting the new regulations, especially for websites hosted on the University’s main platforms: Terminalfour (t4) and WordPress.

What does this mean for you?

If you write content that appears on University websites or create documents for downloading, then you will need to make sure this content is accessible. A new web accessibility page on StaffNet highlights the key things you need to think about. We plan to expand this information over the coming weeks to cover a wider range of topics.

If you are responsible for a University website that is hosted outside the main University platforms (t4 and WordPress), you will need to carry out your own assessment of your website’s accessibility. You may also need to provide your own accessibility statement for that site. There’s a template for this on our web accessibility page.

Over the coming weeks, we will be publishing more detailed guidance, but in the meantime, if you have any questions, please contact the web or digital team in your Faculty or Directorate.