blog.gov.jeHappy Global Accessibility Awareness Day from the Web Services Team.
We thought we’d give you an update on what’s been happening behind the scenes to make gov.je a more open, welcoming and inclusive environment.
Accessibility audit and upgrade
Following an accessibility audit of gov.je, facilitated by our Disability and Inclusion Team, some issues highlighted that we needed to upgrade our website.
We’re happy to say that an upgrade to the website’s Content Management System (CMS) happened in December 2023 providing some much-needed solutions for us. We’re also continuing to monitor and review accessibility across gov.je, adjusting wherever we can.
Our performance overall
Generally, the Government of Jersey website is performing very well compared to many other government websites.
We have the least amount of ‘Level A failures’ compared to other countries listed in the Sitemorse index table below.
A ‘Level A failure’ is when you fail to meet one of the 25 Level A success criteria set out in the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0
Find out more about WCAG levels on My Accessible Website.
| Country | Level A failures |
| Jersey | 4 |
| Slovakia | 5 |
| Norway | 6 |
| Spain | 6 |
| Netherlands | 7 |
| United Kingdom | 7 |
| Belgium | 8 |
| Austria | 9 |
| Poland | 9 |
| France | 16 |
| Germany | 16 |
| Czech Republic | 20 |
| Italy | 26 |
| Sweden | 37 |
| Denmark | 44 |
| Portugal | 44 |
| Croatia | 46 |
| Guernsey | 49 |
| Rep of Ireland | 114 |
| Switzerland | 132 |
| Information correct as of April 2024. | |
Success stories
The Web Services Team has made great strides forward in accessibility, highlighted below are several significant successes:
- we designed new easy read webpages for our Adult Learning Disability site. We’re one of very few government websites providing easy read in HTML
- our new easy read HTML webpages are available for use across the organisation and have already been incorporated into our Long-Term Care Scheme and Income Support information on gov.je
- we published new easy read guidelines in our service manual which includes a new easy read leaflet template
- we purchased a Photo Symbols image licence so we can use inclusive imagery in our easy read communications
- we published our accessibility testing guidelines
- we’re working on our inclusive language guide, which will be available soon
- we’re delivering ongoing training within the organisation which is creating a shift in culture and getting people keen to learn about accessibility and inclusion
- key government documentation that would usually be delivered as inaccessible PDFs is now being published in much more accessible long HTML web pages. Some examples include:
We love to hear your feedback
We’re committed to providing a website that is accessible to the widest possible audience.
We would love to hear your views on accessibility on gov.je. Your feedback helps us to keep improving and deliver services that are inclusive for everyone.
You can email us at digital@gov.je or use our smiley feedback feature on gov.je, you’ll find it in the bottom right-hand corner of all our webpages.
