Government for All

A talk I gave at Accessible Bristol on the accessibility work we've done on www.gov.uk, who we do it for, and how we can help others by sharing the work we're doing.

Transcript

1. GDS Joshua Marshall Joshua Marshall Developer & Accessibility Lead Government Digital Service @partiallyblind
2. GDS Joshua Marshall Government for all. Accessible Bristol 28 November 2012 Moving to Digital by Default. How to make sure we don’t leave anyone behind.
3. GDS Joshua Marshall What I do. Front-end Developer accessibility lead for the GDS and GOV.UK. Responsible for testing everything for GDS, training for devs and editors, a11y strategy Providing UK Gov position in cross-gov International Accessibility Sharing Extranet
4. GDS Joshua Marshall Front-end Developer accessibility lead for the GDS and GOV.UK. Responsible for testing everything for GDS, training for devs and editors, a11y strategy Providing UK Gov position in cross-gov International Accessibility Sharing Extranet
5. GDS Joshua Marshall Who I do it for. YOU. All citizens, foreign nationals coming here needing info. 63 million+ of you. 30 million+ visits per month. Disabled/non-disabled, ages 9-up/devolved admins. Everyone needing to interact with state online.
6. GDS Joshua Marshall No pressure then...
7. GDS Joshua Marshall Why should we care? It’s the right thing to do but more importantly IT’S THE SODDING LAW! Equality Act 2010 but come on. We can and should do better for our citizens. ALL of them.
8. GDS Joshua Marshall So how do we make that happen? Be realistic about your audience, your timescales and your skills. Be pragmatic - not slaves to checklists focus on the user. lower a agile / small product teams with defined product owner user story in Pivotal / iterate quickly / test continuously / test with real users asap / rinse +repeat
9. GDS Joshua Marshall Ask really nicely. flatter, buy them a pint, help in any way you can ...and if that doesn’t work?
10. GDS Joshua Marshall Lie, cheat, beg, steal * Don’t ask, just do it. Teach them something cool so they think it’s their idea. Bribe them. Use the work of others - someone’s probably done it better already.
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12. GDS Joshua Marshall Note: this advice breaks the Civil Service Code, so let’s keep it between us, eh? * Don’t ask, just do it. Teach them something cool so they think it’s their idea. Bribe them. Use the work of others - someone’s probably done it better already.
13. GDS Joshua Marshall Start small. Add ARIA roles to main content areas. Boom, you just made things better for someone. Fix contrast or visible keyboard focus. Scrap rubbish ALT text. Make your tables better. Little things add up.
14. GDS Joshua Marshall Have an ideal. WCAG 2.0 AA at least / HTML5 / work without js / POSH work in most modern browsers, most stuff in old IE
15. GDS Joshua Marshall There is always more work to be done. That's okay! There’s always more to do. Embrace it. Find better ways to do everything and get used to change. It’s never finished.
16. GDS Joshua Marshall So how can we help? Setting an example. Design Principles. Provide up to date docs and guidance. Digital by Default Standard in 2013.
17. GDS Joshua Marshall Setting an example. Design Principles. Provide up to date docs and guidance. Digital by Default Standard in 2013.
18. GDS Joshua Marshall From April 2013, the Digital by Default service standard will set the bar for what is considered high quality for a new or redesigned digital service. It will be used to ensure that all digital services offered on GOV.UK are of a consistently high standard. New and redesigned services that do not meet the standard will not be hosted on GOV.UK.
19. GDS Joshua Marshall From April 2013, the Digital by Default service standard will set the bar for what is considered high quality for a new or redesigned digital service. It will be used to ensure that all digital services offered on GOV.UK are of a consistently high standard. New and redesigned services that do not meet the standard will not be hosted on GOV.UK. Standard is not guidance: mixture of not-optional instructions and very-strongly- recommended best practices. Very big stick: it’s not accessible? Bugger off and come back when it is...
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21. GDS Joshua Marshall If we can do it for an entire nation, what’s stopping you? Only the beginning but we want to make it the best it can possibly be, for everyone. Ballsy statement, but we’re trying to put our money where our mouth is. Feedback welcome.
22. GDS Joshua Marshall Thanks.
23. GDS Joshua Marshall Joshua Marshall Developer & Accessibility Lead Government Digital Service @partiallyblind