Accessibility Statement

NIHR is committed to making its websites and mobile applications accessible, in accordance with national legislation transposing Directive (EU) 2016/2102 of the European Parliament and of the Council and in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.                             

This accessibility statement applies to https://sites.google.com/nihr.ac.uk/nw-research-wf-team

Compliance status

§   This website is partially compliant with WCAG 2.0/2.1AA, due to the non-compliance/exemptions listed below.

It is worth noting Google Sites are not fully WCAG 2.0/2.1 AA compliant due to the reasons specified under Disproportionate burden.

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reason(s):

§ Some images do not have a text alternative, so people using a screen reader cannot access the information. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1 (non-text content). We plan to add text alternatives for all images by September 2020. When we publish new content we’ll make sure our use of images meets accessibility standards.

§ Wave identifies that there is a low contrast issue but doesn’t confirm where this is on the webpage for it to be addressed. We plan to address by September 2021.

Disproportionate burden

This weblink leads to a document which breaks down the existing Google Sites accessibility issues to summarise the existing accessibility issues with Google Sites. Fixing for these accessibility issues is the responsibility of Google as providers of the Google Sites product. Therefore, fixes for these issues are beyond NIHR control. The only resolution to fixing these issues ourselves is to change website hosts to another supplier. We’ve assessed the cost of fixing these issues and believe that doing so now would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations. We continue to work with Google in providing feedback and collaborating to ensure Google’s products are as accessible as possible.

Content that is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

This website contains PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our service. These have been checked for accessibility. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. By September 2021, we plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.

Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards. However, some of the documents that we link to for additional information are outside our control and may not be fully accessible. 

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 17th June 2021

The statement was last reviewed on 7th March 2023

We used a third-party accessibility tool called WAVE to test the accessibility of this website. WAVE can identify many accessibility and Web Content Accessibility Guideline (WCAG) errors, but also facilitates human evaluation of web content. A full explanation of how this tool works can be found on WAVE’s website.  

Feedback and contact information

If you wish to report any accessibility challenges in using this website, or if you require any information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille, please contact:

email  learning.lcrnsnorthwest@nihr.ac.uk 

call  07812 659 453 

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 30 days. If you do not receive a response, please contact the NIHR Service Desk for assistance. 

Enforcement procedure

If you do not receive a response to the above request, please contact the NIHR Service Desk for further escalation.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

This website has been built using Google Sites. Please see the following link to the NIHR Hub Accessibility Statement which gives more information regarding the general use of Google Sites, including contact details for users who require further Accessibility support.