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Re: regulations on accessibility to government web sites around the world, what exists and what criteria is used to measure it

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From: Andrew Kirkpatrick
Date: Mar 31, 2011 8:15AM


Birkir,
I feel strongly that we have worked very hard in accessibility to develop robust and testable standards, and the goal is now to harmonize the policy implementations so that we don't have different standards in different locales. As such, WCAG 2.0 should be the basis of any new standard. This is what is being implemented in many countries and is being discussed for Mandate 376, which is the European Union's effort to define accessibility standards for the EU. If the Icelandic application to join the EU is successfully concluded in 2012, then it would be covered by the M-376 rules.

Thanks,
AWK

Andrew Kirkpatrick
Group Product Manager, Accessibility
Adobe Systems

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http://twitter.com/awkawk
http://blogs.adobe.com/accessibility

-----Original Message-----
From: <EMAIL REMOVED> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Sent: Thursday, March 31, 2011 9:47 AM
To: WebAIM Discussion List
Subject: [WebAIM] regulations on accessibility to government web sites around the world, what exists and what criteria is used to measure it

Hi listers

I got an unusual request today. One of the Icelandic members of parliament wants to initiate a regulatory procedure on minimum accessibility requirements to all government web sites.
He asked me what the regulations are like in other counries and what is used to measure and rrate minimum accessibility.
I know of ADA Title II and section 508, but both are, unfortunately, not as comprehensive and clear as we would wish them to be.
Does anyone have anything for me in this area, Canada/Australia/UK/other countries that have regulations?
I would suggest that web pages need to pass all WCAG 2.0 priority I testing at the least.
The odd thing, is that this is a last minute proposal so I have 24 hours to send in some suggestions on what I think should be included, so any relatively quick responses would be most appreciated.
Thanks and be well.
-Birkir