Accessibility

This Council recognises that goods and services must be offered on equal terms to all in the community and takes its responsibilities under the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) seriously. The internet is a key enabler for disabled users to obtain information and be involved in their local community. We are committed to providing our online services to all sections of the community.

Conformance to Guidelines

This site displays the following logos on this Accessibility page only, as all pages on this site may not conform to these levels. In general, the site conforms to these levels where HTML is used. Where documents are made available in other formats, conformance has not been achieved.

Access keys

These apply to the main navigation and top level section pages. See our Access keys page for further information. 

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Changing your browser settings - font sizes and colours

If you have trouble reading text on web pages, you can alter your browser settings in order to modify font sizes, styles and colours and foreground and background colours.

Instructions for altering these settings using the Internet Explorer, Netscape, Firefox, Opera and Safari browsers can be found on the Web Accessibility Initiative's website at: http://www.w3.org/WAI/changedesign.html

Language and Translation

We aim to provide this website in as many different languages as possible. Below we have provided links to our home page in a number of differerent languages. From the home page you should be able to navigate the entire site in your chosen language.

Use

to view our site in:

 Deutsch
 Français
 Español
 Italiano
 Portuguese

Use AltaVista's Babel Fish

to view our site in:

 Chinese
 Japanese
 Korean

Use  to translate this site into  Arabic

Try World Lingo to translate to  Russian
Try World Lingo to translate to  Dutch

Use World Lingo for  Bengali translation service

About Browsealoud

Browsealoud is free-to-download software that allows websites to be speech-enabled. This will be particularly helpful for those with reading difficulties, literacy problems, dyslexia, mild vision difficulties and where English is not their first language. See our Browsealoud page for more details.

Other features

• 'Alternative text' and 'Title' to describe the content of a picture.
• 'Skip navigation' feature to allow users to go straight to the main content area of a page. 
• Print version showing only the main content of the page.
• Use of 'cascading style sheets' so that the page settings can be over-ridden.
• Main content headings are shown as 'h1' and subheadings are 'h2'.
• Help page showing useful information on PDF files with further links to Adobe Acrobat Access reader, how to change the settings on your browser and more.

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Your Comments

If you have any suggestions on how we can improve accessibility or if you encounter any problems, please contact us.

Useful Accessibility websites

The sites below show further information about accessibility issues and guidelines.

The RNIB's web access centre provides information and advice on making your website accessibile to all. For more, use the following external link to go to their website
www.rnib.org.uk/xpedio/groups/public/documents/code/public_rnib008789.hcsp

The following external link goes to the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) website, which shows their homepage, with news, technologies and ways to get involved
www.w3.org/

The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) strategies, guidelines and resources to help make the web accessible to people with disabilities can be found via the following external link
www.w3.org/WAI

The following external link goes to the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
content accessibility guidelines

The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) promotes civil rights for disabled people and protects them from discrimination. Find out more from the following external link to their website
www.direct.gov.uk/en/DisabledPeople/RightsAndObligations/DisabilityRights/DG_4001068

Use the following external link to go to the Watchfire webXACT online checker to test single webpages for quality, accessibility and privacy issues
webxact.watchfire.com/

Check your web page via the following external link which goes to the Pennsylvania's Initiative on Assistive Technologies (WAVE) web accessibility checker
wave.webaim.org/

The following external link goes to Jakob Nielsen's usability website
www.useit.com/

Adobe's accessibility resource centre can be found via the following external link
www.adobe.com/accessibility/index.html

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