Accessibility
We recognise the importance of providing a website that is accessible to as wide an audience of users as possible. We are well aware that some people with disabilities find using the internet difficult and we also know that many sites do not accommodate those with visual or other disabilities. With this in mind we have tried our best to make this website as accessible as possible.
We have introduced numerous features to ensure the best use of our site by all of our users.
Headings and navigation menus
HTML heading tags are used to convey document structure. H1 tags are used for main titles, H2 tags for subtitles etc.
Navigation menus are marked up as HTML lists. This ensures that the number of links in the list is read out at the start and it can be skipped easily.
Images
All images used in this site include descriptive alt tag attributes. Where an image has no use other than being decorative the alt tag is set to null to allow easy reading of the site by all users.
Colours
We have taken care to ensure that the site's font and background colour combinations contrast significantly and are effective in ensuring information is still clear when viewed in different colour combinations.
Font size
Most of the font sizes we use on our site are sizable. You can change the font size to make it either larger or smaller via your browser settings. In IE go to View > Text Size > Larger etc. In Firefox go to View > Text Size > Increase/Decrease.
Stylesheets
This site uses cascading style sheets for all visual layout. If your browser or browsing device does not support stylesheets at all, the use of structured semantic mark up ensures that the content of each page is still readable and clearly structured.
Forms and fields
All forms fields follow a logical tab sequence to ensure easy navigation. Most form fields also have ‘label’ and ‘id’ attributes to explicitly associate the form field with its label to allow for easy entry of data.
JavaScript
The use of Java script has been kept to an absolute minimum. Where it is used then all pages and process are still accessible should Javascript be turned off.
Links
All links have been written to make sense when taken out of context. Where appropriate, we have also added link title attributes to describe the link in greater detail. These descriptions can be seen when you hold your mouse over the link.
