8 / Canadian Government Executive // Summer 2023 ACCESSIBILITY uploaded that have images without a text alternative or proper tagging. This would catch many of the PDFs that are uploaded to government sites. There also should just be more friction in the process of uploading PDFs, so that departments shift their behaviours. Publishing tools can be configured to actively discourage users from uploading PDFs, and explaining how they can use other formats like EPUB. Creating HTML or EPUB documents is often much easier when authors are starting with their original publishing tool (often MS Word). 2) Standardize governmentwide accessibility monitoring Because of the Web Accessibility Directive, both European Union countries and the UK are doing government-wide accessibility monitoring. For countries following this EU Directive, they must provide a public report of digital accessibility every three years. 2022 was the first year these monitoring reports were made available and many also have English translations. Each member state of the EU chooses its own path to accomplish this, but they have made efforts to make results that are comparable. The European Commission has funded the W3C’s Accessibility Conformance Testing (ACT) to see that there are different open source accessibility engines that can be used, but that have comparable results. Ireland and the Netherlands both have introduced a dashboard that allows departments to make meaningful comparisons. In Canada, it should be mandatory that the full reports from government departments are made public to allow for independent evaluations and comparisons. The reports should include both automated testing, manual testing, and feedback from users with disabilities. Create a dashboard that highlights errors Open source tools now allow for basic government-wide accessibility testing. Government agencies can find real barriers and avoid false positives, by using site-wide accessibility monitoring services. Many are currently using proprietary tools which take a page by page approach. Some departments are using these tools to support their accessibility efforts. When looking at a governmentwide solution a proprietary solution would be too expensive and limited in scope. A centralized accessibility scanning service, funded by the federal government, leveraging open source tools, would centralize the cost and remove budgetary barriers for individual departments. It would also provide a common platform for basic metrics, which would provide useful comparisons that are nearly impossible today. Inconsistent evaluation practices of different agencies makes central reporting far less meaningful. Self reporting by agencies provides far too much room for bias. By leveraging common open source tools like Deque’s axe, it is possible to create a meaningful dashboard which highlights a common set of accessibility barriers across all government departments. The Netherlands has an excellent example of what In Canada, it should be mandatory that the full reports from government departments are made public to allow for independent evaluations and comparisons. The reports should include both automated testing, manual testing, and feedback from users with disabilities.
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