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Re: A question on regulations - NAM

for

From: L Snider
Date: Feb 16, 2021 6:15AM

I will answer the AODA part.

The current Information and Communications Standard was started in
2007...think of how much has changed since then! They just did a revision,
but look at the proposed Phase II for the future of it (not for 2021 or
2022 likely).

When any legislation (I have been part of developing legislation, not in
Ontario) uses a specific standard, yes then people can say oh I am wcag 2.0
compliant...it is unfortunate...there was a move in another province ,and I
hope with the federal standard and new provinces now developing the
Information and Communications Standards (ICS), to not put standards into
the legislation. This would be the best scenario, because it would mean
that there is way more flexibility, and creativity. Look for the Phase II
work done by the Ontario review committee of the ICS, it shows this, as
does the first draft put out by the committee in Manitoba (the government
changed it). In my view, the future of legislation is in the EU Mandate
376, the Functional Performance Statements (and similar Section 508 ones).

Legislation, and standards, are both flawed because they are like wood, and
people are like water. People have different needs, and no standard or
legislation can account for all those needs. As well, in my personal view,
compliance to WCAG is also not possible for many reasons. In my work, I
have always gone way, way further than WCAG. WCAG was only the base,
because it left so much out (the people developing it are super people but
again standards dealing with people will always be flawed).

My personal view is that WCAG started out as a guideline, it was super as a
guideline and the principles were great. Once legislation took hold of it,
it changed it and made it into something it can't be-'a be all and end all
of making things accessible'.

The people who developed WCAG did great work, no doubt at all, but I have
been working with it since 1999 and for me, it has only been the start, not
the end goal. I personally want to see legislation go in different
directions than to specifically mention standards.

Cheers

Lisa

On Tue, Feb 16, 2021 at 8:31 AM Vaibhav Saraf < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
wrote:

> Hi Everyone,
>
> I was reading about some of the prominent accessibility regulations in
> North America and had some questions around them. ADA will cover any
> website in the public domain which is inaccessible to persons with
> disabilities, irrespective of whether it is complying to WCAG x (we have
> seen many websites solely dependent on automated checkers getting there).
>
> I have a question when it comes to Section 508, since the course for it's
> Trusted Tester program specifically talks about WCAG 2.0 SCs. Of course the
> training program covers maximum of manual tests but still I was wondering a
> case when a piece of procured software turns out to be inaccessible for an
> employee with disability (due to a testing flaw or whatever reason,
> ofcourse many vendors rely highly on automated checkers while making some
> of these). In such a case the software provider will still be sued or will
> the contract be terminated or any other action for the non-compliance is
> there in place?
>
> And how is it for AODA, reading many of the interpretations of the law made
> me think that being WCAG 2.0 compliant is enough to pass the requirement
> and doze off any lawsuits. Well I don't hope that my understanding to date
> is correct, I need a little more of some expert's guidance about this.
>
> Thanks,
> Vaibhav
> > > > >