Our website has been designed with the following accessibility guidelines in mind:
- Our pages are designed so that they can be viewed at a screen resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels.
- Page structure is conveyed using header elements.
- A stylesheet is used on our website and relative font sizes on all text with the exception of graphical text.
- Text can be increased or decreased in size by using the "view" option in your browser.
- Images that convey important information have alternative text. Where an image is used for a decorative purpose the - alternative text will be left blank.
- No information is exclusively conveyed using colour.
- A site map is available to provide information about the layout of the website.
Keyboard access
On each page a 'skip to main content' link allows direct access past the navigation bars to the page's main content, which should make navigation easier if you are using the keyboard or other input device to browse.
Keyboard shortcuts are intended to help users who have difficulty in using pointing devices such as a mouse. This website uses an accesskey system which is detailed below.
Depending on the browser you are using select one of the following:
- If you are using Microsoft Internet Explorer 4, press ‘Alt’ and the relevant shortcut key (eg 0 for the home page) at the same time.
- If you are using Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 or later version, press ‘Alt’ and the relevant shortcut key and then press the enter key.
- If you are using Netscape 6 or later version, click anywhere on the page, then press ‘Alt’ and the relevant shortcut key at the same time.
Visual Design
Cascading Style Sheets have been used to control the presentation of pages and properly structured markup has been used for content.
If stylesheets are not supported or are turned off, information on the site can still be accessed and read
Relative font sizes are used, which allows users to resize text as needed
Downloading pdfs documents
To read PDF documents with a screen reader please link to the Access Adobe website which provides useful tools and resources. Adobe also has a free online conversion tool for pdfs.
Browser compatibility
The standard supported browser versions are:
Internet Explorer v6.0, v7.0
Firefox v1.5
Opera v9+
On Windows platforms only (NT4, 95, 98, ME, 2000, XP) and Macintosh computers (OSX 10) Firefox v2, Safari v2.
Further information
To learn more about web accessibility visit the RNIB Web Access Centre
To obtain a copy of the screen reader JAWS
Get in touch
If you have difficulty accessing the site or have any comments or feedback, please do not hesitate to get in touch.