SEND Local Offer accessibility
To ensure Somerset’s SEND Local Offer is accessible to all, we need to focus on helping people work their way around it, removing barriers to navigating the Local Offer website and the wider SEND system.
The website text size can be changed within the browser to suit the user. The website is designed around the Somerset SEND Brand Guidelines which have been designed to meet equalities and accessibility standards. We are also developing style guidelines to help keep contributions to the site consistent.
We are committed to making Somerset’s SEND Local Offer website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018, detailed in our somerset.gov.uk accessibility statement. 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 400% 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 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. Google Translate is recommended for people who read English as an additional language. The website is automatically tested regularly using Silktide. This is a third-party platform to test the accessibility quality and usability of the site. The website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard. But we do know some parts of the website are not fully accessible:
- most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
- some images do not specify alternative text
- our maps do not function well for keyboard users
- some buttons on our online forms are not correctly identified, and are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard or assistive technology.