Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats)
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136. To ask the Taoiseach the way in which his Department and agencies under his remit are meeting the requirement to have a statement on the compliance of their websites and mobile applications with the regulations under the directive 2016/2102 (EU), as articulated in SI No. 358/2020 - European Union (Accessibility of Websites and Mobile Applications of Public Sector Bodies) Regulations 2020. [31291/21]

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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My Department’s website www.taoiseach.gov.ie is hosted on the gov.ie central platform managed by the Office of the Government Chief Information Office ( OGCIO ). This is the main government site with over 122 million pageviews in 2020 and it partially complies with the double-A WCAG 2.1 standards and the 4 principles of accessibility in that it is perceivable, operable, understandable and robust. This is similar to most other government sites across the EU. Accessibility is being improved is by increasing the level of plain English used for services on the site. This allows users of all levels to be able to find and understand information as quickly as possible. The gov.ie team in OGCIO has performed multiple accessibility reviews since the website went live and they engaged with an accessibility expert to outline all accessibility requirements. This is an ongoing process. Following the last accessibility audit, 65 issues were fixed and OGCIO have since released updates to the core code of the site to improve accessibility. An audit of the Merrion Street website is currently underway with a view to enhancing user experience and accessibility.

Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats)
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137. To ask the Taoiseach the way in which his Department and agencies under his remit are meeting the requirement to subject to Regulation 6, public sector bodies shall, in accordance with Regulation 3, take necessary measures to make their websites and mobile applications more accessible by making them perceivable, operable, understandable and robust under the directive 2016/2102 (EU), as articulated in SI No. 358/2020 - European Union (Accessibility of Websites and Mobile Applications of Public Sector Bodies) Regulations 2020. [31309/21]

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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My Department’s website (www.taoiseach.gov.ie) has a compliant accessibility statement which details the commitments, compliance, and testing details of the website. It contains a commitment to achieve the AA standard under WCAG 2.1 guidelines. The website uses the WCAG level AA guidelines to test how accessible it is. The website Accessibility Conformance Evaluation Methodology (WCAG-EM) approach is used to assess the site. Regular accessibility audits have been carried out with user testing on the site.

Accessibility on the website will be improved by :

- making photo-descriptions mandatory on gov.ie and carrying out regular spot-checks on photos on a quarterly basis.

- Publishing HTML pages instead of less accessible formats like PDF.

- Increased use of plain English to describe services to members of the public.

Complaints about the accessibility of content are managed by my Department's Disability Access Officer.

An audit of the Merrion Street website is currently underway with a view to enhancing user experience and accessibility.