Accessibility features

Plain English

We try to write in plain English and avoid jargon where possible. If you don't understand something, please let us know.

Listen to our website

You can use ReachDeck (external website) to listen to our website by clicking on the ReachDeck link that appears at the bottom of our web pages:

ReachDeck Icon

ReachDeck is useful if you:

  • have dyslexia
  • have learning difficulties
  • have mild visual impairments
  • use English as a second language

Heading structures

We use simple heading structures on our website which make our pages easier to navigate, especially for people with screen readers.

Web standards

Most of our web pages comply with HTML standards as set out by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) (external website).

We use a number of testing tools when publishing web pages to ensure our website is accessible as possible. More information about the tools we use to test our website can be found in our accessibility statement.

Links

To notify screen reader users, we include (external website) references in all links to external websites. For document links, we aim to provide document format and size information in most of our links.

Access keys

The following access keys can be used on our website to navigate directly to website features or pages listed below:

S - Skip navigation

1 - Home page

3 - Site map

4 - Search

8 - Terms and conditions

9 - Feedback form (Contact us page)

Site map

A directory of our online information and services is available on our site map page.

Forms

We use a number of online forms on this website, supplied by various systems. Our online are not fully accessible to screen readers and we're working with our suppliers to resolve this.

Documents

We aim to make our documents as accessible to as many people as possible. Please see our accessible document policy for more information about our online documents and what we're doing to improve accessibility.

Changeable page features

Text size

If you find the site's default text size is too small or large, you can change it with your browser's built-in text size (zoom) feature.

To resize our web page text using your browser:

  • use the 'View' menu and then select 'Text Size', in Windows Internet Explorer (including Pocket IE)
  • use the 'View' menu and then select 'Text Size', in Firefox and other Mozilla browsers
  • use the 'View' and then 'Make Text Bigger' options, in Safari
  • use the 'View' and 'Style' menus, and then 'User Mode', in Opera
  • use the 'View' and then 'Text Zoom' menu, in Macintosh Internet Explorer and Netscape 6 and 7
  • With a wheel-mouse, you may be able to change the text size by holding down the Control or Command key and turning the wheel. In some browsers, you can change the text size using Control or Command and the + or - keys.

Text style and colour

You can also specify the font styles, colours, as well as the foreground and background colours. The way you do this varies from browser to browser, with you needing to:

  • use 'Tools' in 'Internet Options', with Windows Internet Explorer (including Pocket IE).
  • use 'Tools' in 'Options' under 'Content', in Firefox and other Mozilla browsers.
  • use the 'View' and then 'Make Text Bigger' options, in Safari.
  • use the 'View' menu and then 'Zoom', in Opera.
  • use the 'View' menu and then 'Text Zoom', in Macintosh Internet Explorer, and Netscape 6 and 7.