Accessibility statement for the Police Scotland website
This accessibility statement is for the Police Scotland website.
The Police Scotland website was dip-sample audited as per the UK Government guidelines.
This audit identified a number of areas where Police Scotland could strive for greater accessibility and compliance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard.
How accessible this website is
We want the website to be as accessible as possible. We will ensure that:
Correct HTML mark-up is used for web pages.
We will ensure elements such as lists, tables, links and images follow the WCAG AA standard.
The site pages are web standards compliant and most can be:
- Zoomed in on
- The user can move about the page and interact with keyboard only
- Have more than one form of navigation
- Use meaningful link titles and image alt tags.
- Videos don’t auto play and have correct subtitles
- Form fields behave as expected and can be used without a mouse.
We recognise from the audit that a full review is required. This will identify areas that fall below the AA standard. The audit identified:
- That PDFs are likely to contain incorrect document mark up/structure
- PDF diagrams are likely to not be suitable for assistive technology
- Interactive elements that the user cannot control (pause, play, advance function)
- Colour contrast on some text areas
- Overly complicated writing style/text on pages.
Police Scotland is working to fix these issues.
Feedback and contact information
If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:
email: CorpCommunications@scotland.pnn.police.uk
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, please us the contact details above.
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).
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
The Police Service of Scotland is committed to making its website accessible. This is in line with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Compliance status
This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard. This is due to ‘the non-compliances’ listed below.
Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations
The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.
Non-accessible content
- PDFs are likely to contain incorrect document mark-up/structure (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#section-headings). We plan on resolving this issue by end of September 2022
- PDF diagrams are likely to not be suitable for assistive technology (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#non-text-content). We plan on resolving this issue by end of September 2022
- Interactive elements that the user cannot control (pause, play, advance function) (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#pause-stop-hide). We plan on resolving this issue by end of March 2021
- Colour contrast on some text areas (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#contrast-minimum). We plan on resolving this issue by end of March 2021
- Overly complicated writing style/text on pages (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#reading-level). We plan on resolving this issue by end of March 2021, except Access to Information section by end of September 2022
- Some image alt tags and link titles require rewriting (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#textalternatives). We plan on resolving this issue by end of March 2021
- A number of HTML pages are likely to contain incorrect document mark-up/structure (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#section-headings) - we plan on resolving this issue by end of March 2021
The times scales for fixing these issues will be outline in the Police Scotland website accessibility road map.
Update 9 April 2021
After the statement preparation on 23/09/2020 we have fixed the following:
- Interactive elements that the user cannot control (pause, play, advance function) (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#pause-stop-hide). We have changed the homepage carousel to a static image
- Colour contrast on some text areas (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#contrast-minimum). We have increased the colour contrast in the website templates by using a darker background colour. We have increased the text size in the website footer.
- Overly complicated writing style/text on pages (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#reading-level). We have simplified the language for Keep Safe and Your Community sections
- Forms have only one means of navigation (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#consistent-navigation) Corporate Communications Department have worked with the ICT department to check compliance.
Disproportionate burden
Making all new PDFs and Word documents on the Police Scotland website compliant will required national training and in some cases software upgrades.
Therefore document compliance will take longer to implement.
Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
PDFs and other documents
Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services and forms published as Word documents.
We will plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.
The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services. For example, statistical data.
What we’re doing to improve accessibility
- We are reviewing HTML page mark up to ensure compliance with Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard
- We are reviewing our use of language to make content easily understandable
- We will work with our development team to look at implementing functional/template changes as required
- We will work with departments that produce PDFs/Word documents to ensure compliance
- We are producing an accessibility roadmap to outline how we will strive for compliance.
Preparation of this accessibility statement
This statement was prepared on 23/09/2020. It was last reviewed on 31/03/2021, updated on 09/04/2021 and 31/03/2022.
This website was tested on 14/09/2020. The test was carried out by Police Scotland.
We decided on a sample of pages to test as follows, as they covered the types of pages and content widely found across the website:
- Home page
- What’s Happening landing page
- News landing page
- News article
- Campaign page
- Keep Safe landing page
- Keep Safe advice page
- Recruitment job advert
- Access to Information page
- About Us landing page
- About Us > Management Information Reports page
- About Us > Exec structure
- Contact Us landing page
- Contact Us form
- Domestic Abuse Disclosure form
- Cookie setting page
- Local Policing landing page
- Local Policing > Divisional page
- Local Policing > Command Area page.