Skip to main content

Accessibility Statement

Accessibility statement for middevon.gov.uk

This accessibility statement applies to www.middevon.gov.uk

This website is run by Mid Devon District Council. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website.

Mid Devon District Council endeavours to make this website as accessible as possible to everyone, including those with disabilities and those who use assistive technologies to browse the web. Some of the ways in which we strive to achieve this are as follows:

  • 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.

How accessible this website is

We know some parts of this website aren’t fully accessible:

  • Older PDF documents aren’t fully accessible to screen reader software
  • Many documents are in PDF format and are not accessible in third party systems such as Idox Public Access or Modern.Gov (see third party systems)

What to do if you can’t access parts of this website

If you need information on this website in a different format please contact us using the details below:

Email: customerfirst@middevon.gov.uk
Call: 01884 255255
Letter:

Customer Services
Mid Devon District Council
Phoenix House
Phoenix Lane 
Tiverton EX16 6PP

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 aren’t listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements please use the “Tell us how we can improve this page” option at the bottom of every page or contact us by using the contact us form, emailing customer services customerservices@middevon.gov.uk or phoning 01884 255255 to discuss the issue with an advisor.

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).

Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person

We provide a relay assistance service for people who are D/deaf, hearing impaired or have a speech impediment.

Our offices have audio induction loops, or if you contact us before your visit we can arrange a British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter.

Find out how to contact us by phone or visiting us in person

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

Mid Devon District 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-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Issues with PDFs and other documents

Many of our older PDFs and other documents don’t meet accessibility standards - for example, they may not be marked up so they’re 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.

We aim to ensure that any new documents we publish meet accessibility standards.

Third Party Systems

IDOX Public Access v3.2

As yet the IDOX software is not able to create fully accessible PDF documents. This means that they may not be read by a screen reader.

We are in the process of amending our document templates to make them accessible. This means that when the next version of Public Access is released, all future documents will be accessible.

Documents created before September 2018 do not need to be made accessible. However, this leaves many PDF documents produced by us between September 2018 and September 2020 that may not fully meet accessibility requirements, or be read by a screen reader.

Accessibilty Enhancements in V3.4 due later in 2021

“At Idox we take accessibility issues very seriously, and so in this release we've focused on addressing these issues and have included a large number of accessibility enhancements. This includes work providing:”

  • Clear page titles for better orientation.
  • Alternative text description for images (“alt text”) and other non-text elements.
  • Consistent and clear use of headings, including a semantic hierarchy where possible.
  • Association of form controls with corresponding labels.
  • Logical order for forms that can be navigated using a keyboard (for example using the Tab key to move between fields).
  • Clear form error messages in proximity to the corresponding form fields.
  • Association of all data cells in a data table with their headers.
  • Meaningful text for hyperlinks (and a title attribute, where applicable).
  • Sufficient foreground and background colour contrast combinations for clear readability.
  • Keyboard navigation, including for menus and calendar controls. The Accessibility Response document for Public Access has been updated accordingly and is available via the Customer Portal.

If you need information in a different format, please contact us and tell us which document(s) you would like to access, as well as your name and email address.

 

Civica Modern.Gov

Our democracy site is supplied by Civica.

ModernGov software is not able to create fully accessible PDF documents. This means that they may not be read by a screen reader and have issues such as:

  • Not PDF Tagged so difficult to navigate and can't be read by a screen reader easily.
  • Don't have a default declared language.
  • Have a missing document title.

All future documents will be accessible with the next release of Modern.Gov. The 1506 update is scheduled for end of 2021.

  • Documents created before September 2018 do not need to be made accessible. However, this leaves around 6500 PDF documents produced from September 2018 to the present date that may not fully meet accessibility requirements, or be read by a screen reader.

If you need information in a different format, please contact us and tell us which document(s) you would like to access, as well as your name and email address.

 

Disproportionate burden

We have not identified anything that qualifies as disproportionate burden as of yet, but we are still evaluating our sites and may update this when we identify issues.

PDFs and other documents

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

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.

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

How we tested this website

This website was last tested on 25th March 2024. The test was carried out by Mid Devon District Council using SortSite.

We tested:

 

Feedback form

500 character(s) left.
500 character(s) left.
500 character(s) left.

Contact us