We want everyone who visits our website to be able to access the full range of services available, regardless of their skill or technology.
The current version of this website was launched in 2016, but some individual elements of it may not have been updated since then.
How accessible the site is
We know some parts of this website aren’t fully accessible. We have an action plan and are working to put this right.
What to do if you have problems or queries
If you have any accessibility problems or feedback, please use our contact us page.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the accessibility regulations. If you’re not happy with how we respond, please contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
Durham Heritage Coast is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with The Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Under the Equality Act 2010 we must ensure we do not unlawfully discriminate in our service delivery and make reasonable adjustments for people with disabilities where necessary. We are constantly working to improve the accessibility and usability of our site.
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
Information about which areas of the website fail.
- background colours: some text / background colours do not have enough contrast, failing success criterion 1.4.3
- forms: some have blank labels or titles, which fails success criterion 4.1.2
- frames and iframes: some do not have a title attribute, failing success criterion 2.4.1
- headings: empty headings fail success criterion 2.4.6
- images: some alt text is the same as the image’s file name, failing success criteria 1.1.1 and 1.2.1
- images in documents: some images/figures do not have an alt tag, failing success criterion 1.1.1
- elements: some elements do not contain text or an img with an alt attribute, failing success criteria 2.4.4, 2.4.9 and 4.1.2
- media: filenames, placeholders or empty text used as text alternatives for timed media, failing success criteria 1.1.1 and 1.2.1
- document titles: some documents have no title failing success criterion 2.4.2
- page language: this is not declared, failing success criterion 3.1.1
- tables: heading elements are not declared and role=presentation is not used, failing success criterion 1.3.1
- stylesheets: absolute positioning fails success criterion 1.3.2
- documents: PDFs are not tagged so are not accessible by screen readers, failing success criterion 1.3.1
- markup: the stylesheet font-weight property is used rather than semantic markup like strong, failing success criterion 1.3.1
- links: these do not have underlining making it hard for colour-blind users to see them, failing success criterion 1.4.1
- outline/border style: the stylesheet makes it difficult to see the dotted link focus outline, failing success criterion 2.4.7
- IDs: some pages has duplicate IDs which cause problems in screen readers, failing success criterion 4.1.1
Accessibility Roadmap
As stated in the non-compliance section, the known issues are listed below:
- HTML – the underlying code used to create this website.
- CSS – used to describe how HTML elements are displayed on this website.
- JavaScript – a development language used to program behaviours on this website.
- Content – this could include web page content or associated PDFs on this website.
A program of work is now underway to address these issues and involves working with Durham County Council’s in-house developers/designers as well as third party functionality providers.
We aim to resolve the above items by September 2021.
Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
- PDFs/documents (pre September 2018): PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 or documents that are not essential to providing our services.
- pre-recorded audio and video published before 23 September 2020
- live audio and video
How we test the site
We re-assess a website or system for accessibility whenever it undergoes a major modification.
Most page content is checked every time it is updated.