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Website accessibility

Our commitment to making our site as accessible to all and how to report issues.

Accessibility statement

This website is run by the London Borough of Waltham Forest. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. You should be able to:

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts
  • 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.

AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

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

If you need information on this website in a different format email web.site@walthamforest.gov.uk

We will aim to get back to you within 21 working days.

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, email web.site@walthamforest.gov.uk

How we test this website

The site is regularly checked for accessibility issues as set out in to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1.

We use automated tools and manual checking to do this.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

The London Borough of Waltham Forest 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.

Issues with images, video and audio

We understand that live video streams are exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations, we realise that this is still an important part of our web content. Live streams of meeting currently do not have live captions and we will be aiming to tackle this going forward.

Most of our videos and promotional videos do have subtitles and going forward this is a requirement for all services producing video content.

We try not to use images as part of our content. Some of our images do not currently have appropriate alt text and descriptions. We are carrying out content reviews to ensure all our content is available through HTML.

Forms and payment systems

Currently our forms are built and hosted using third party products such as Granicus’ Gov Service and Victoria forms.

As part of our work on accessibility we will be looking at issues and raising them with the service providers.

Text and formatting

We are aware of issues with content such as

  • Link text being used in multiple destinations
  • Generic link text
  • Heading not nested properly
  • Structure on headings

These issues are currently a part of how our site was built, we are looking in to this and are aiming to have a new structure and navigation.

Other issues include incorrectly formatted  HTML included tables. Work is being carried out to look at content throughout the site.

All we aim to have all of these issues fixed by February 2021.

PDFs

Many of our older PDFs and Word documents don’t meet accessibility standards. Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services.

As part of our ongoing work we are aiming to have all content written in HTML and accessible to all.

We understand that the 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.

However, if you need information in an alternative format, email web.site@walthamforest.gov.uk

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

This statement was originally prepared February 2020 and reviewed August 2020.

As part of a wider website redevelopment project we aim to address issues with

  • Text and formatting
  • Navigation
  • Images, video and audio
  • Forms and payment systems

by February 2021.

We will continually monitor accessibility and put process’ in place to address accessibility issues going forward.

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the accessibility regulations. If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).