Accessibility

We have tried to remove barriers to our website so that people with disabilities can access information and use the website as easily as possible.

We have designed the site so that it complies with the following:

• Images should have the appropriate ALT tag assigned to them
  
  
• Make links that are descriptive and make sense, with enough information about their destination
  
  
• Ensure that sufficient colour contrast between the text and background and that colour alone is not used to convey information
  
  
• Use style sheets to allow maximum flexibility
  
  
• Use header tags effectively to help clarity of the website
  
  
• No gratuitous uses of multimedia devices
  
  
• Refrain from the use of frames as they can cause difficulty in navigating
  
  
• Ensure that the site can be read by assistive technologies, such as screen reader software
  
  
• Usable interfaces considering; effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction for all users
  
  

Text Size

Making the text larger or smaller can easily be changed using your browser.

To increase or decrease the text size in Internet Explorer:
- Click on the 'View' menu in your browser
- Click on the 'Text size' option
- Select the size you would like to see

To increase or decrease the text size in Netscape Navigator:
- Click on the 'View' menu in your browser
- Click on the 'Increase Font' option

Site Map

A text based site map has been provided so that you get an overall impression of the site quickly and can navigate to all the main areas of the site.

External Links
All external links will load in a new window. This applies to all PDF's and external sites.

PDF Documents

A number of documents available for viewing are in Adobe® Acrobat® Portable Document Format (PDF).

PDF format is used to preserve the content and layout of our publications. Publications in PDF can only be viewed and printed using the Adobe Acrobat Reader. You can download Acrobat Reader at the Adobe Systems, Inc. site free of charge.

People using screen-reading devices generally are unable to read documents directly in PDF format, until they have an accessibility plug-in installed on their system along with the Adobe Acrobat Reader. This plug-in is available for free from Adobe and your screen reader may do this automatically. Adobe also has online tools that will convert PDF files to HTML on request. To get the plug-in and latest news about Adobe's accessibility tools and services, visit the Access Adobe site.

http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/alternate.html

Tested

The website has been tested for the following:

• For colour contrast by printing in black and white and checking how readable the site is
  
  
• Different screen resolutions
  
  
• Different platforms - MAC and PC
  
  
• Different browsers - Internet Explorer 5, 5.5 and 6 and Mozilla (Firefox)
  
  
• Without images - a text equivalent is displayed
  
  
• Without Cascading Style Sheets - it still works, the content is available and makes sense
  
  
• Screen reader software - IBM Home Page Reader v3.0