Accessibility

This page is about the visual accessibility of the City of Rockingham's website.

Visit access and inclusion for information about the City’s commitment to accessibility and inclusiveness in all of its activities.

What is accessibility?

Accessibility refers to ensuring that access to information is available to the widest possible audience as defined by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)'s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1.

Accessibility is about making things usable to all people, whatever their age, ability or disability.

Accessibility compliance

The City of Rockingham is committed to being an accessible and inclusive City. We strive to ensure that information published on this website is accessible to all users including older people as well as people with visual, hearing, cognitive or motor impairments, and that the technology we use does not interfere or deny any user from accessing this information.

Our website has been designed in accordance with the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) internationally recognised Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) guidelines. The WAI is a set of guidelines for producing usable and accessible websites. Detailed information can be found on the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) website.

Our website aims to conform to Level AA of the WCAG 2.1.

We recognise that some information on this website is not as accessible as it could be. Information and online accessibility is an ongoing process and we are continually working to improve the accessibility of this website. If you experience any accessibility problems with our website or with any of the information or documents contained within it please contact us. Also, see the disclaimer below.

Accessibility features

Responsive design

We recognise there is a variety of devices that the community choose to connect with us. These include personal computers, laptops, tablets and mobile phones.  Our website is designed to respond to the type of device being used to view and interact with our website to then display in the most effective way.

Search

Our website has been designed to help you access all the information you need to know quickly and easily.

Find your way around the website using:

  • the search tool at the top of every page;
  • the navigation menu across the top of every page; and
  • breadcrumb navigation allows browsers to keep track of their location within the website hierarchy. Breadcrumbs are displayed on the top of each web page in desktop and tablet mode.
Readability

We make every effort to ensure this website is easy to read using 'plain English' wherever possible. Visually, we take care not to use all capitalised, small cap, or italicised text. Our text is styled only with sans serif font family, and with no kerning. The layout justification on our text headings and paragraphs are either left justified or centred, and never block or full justified across the page.

Navigation

This website allows full tab-based navigation:

  • When you hold down on the menu item or hyperlink, press enter to activate
  • Hold down the shift and tab keys to reverse the tab cycle
  • At the top of each page there are options to skip to various areas of the page. This is to assist users of screen readers and those who are zooming in to view the website.

A 'skip to content' link appears at the top of every page, in the header area. Selecting the 'skip to content' link will take you to the page's main content area.

Increasing and decreasing text size

To scale the font size, use your browser's resizing function. The latest version of several web browsers allow users to easily increase the font size for better readability.

  • Increase font size: Hold down the Ctrl key (Command key on a Macintosh) and press the + (plus) key.
  • Decrease the font size: Hold down the Ctrl or Command key and pressing the - (minus) key.  

Additionally, the Ctrl key (Command key on a Macintosh) and scroll the mouse centre wheel forward or backward, increases or decreases the font size. Both of these methods also work on PDF pages as well.

Also, you may find instructions on the Web Accessibility Initiative site to be helpful. If you are still unsuccessful, you might consider upgrading to the latest version of your browser.

Images

We ensure that titles, text, and alternative (alt) text is given for images and pictures on this website to provide screen readers users access to the information or what it conveys.

You Tube

We are is committed to ensuring that all video content is accessible and aims to meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) to level AA wherever possible.

The City ensures that all videos uploaded to YouTube include captions and transcripts are available if required. However, as YouTube is a third-party product, technical issues may occur that are out of our control, such as links and headings that are either empty or nonsensical.

Hyperlinks

Wherever possible, hyperlinks contain descriptions of information found in the link’s destination. All internal links will open in the same window to improve usability for those with vision impairment. However, documents with external links will open in a new tab.

CSS

Cascading style sheets (CSS) are used to format page content on this site. This allows keyboard-only users to disable the formatting provided and apply their own formatting. Style sheets are disabled within an internet browser's settings or preference options.

Keyboard navigation for links and form elements 

In most browsers, you can use the 'Tab' key to move between links without having to use the mouse. When you are on a link you wish to visit, pressing 'Enter' will take you to the linked page.

If you are in a form, you can also use the 'Tab' key to move between form elements (such as text boxes and radio buttons). Where there are options, for example in a drop-down menu, you can use the arrow keys to select your desired option. When you want to submit or cancel a form, tab through to the relevant button and press the 'Enter' key.

Assistive technologies

ReadSpeaker

The pages on this website have the ReadSpeaker text-to-speech (TTS) screen reader enabled. This TTS technology is helpful especially to visually impaired users. It has a unique feature of being able to download an mp3 audio of the web page.  Its attributes such as voice, speed, loudness, pause, stop, and start is fully controllable. 

Simply click the Listen button to listen to the content of a web page:

An audio player appears and webReader starts reading the text of the web page out loud. You can expand the menu to view more options, including help.

In the player, you can:

  • pause/restart the reading
  • stop the reading
  • use the skip buttons to rewind or forward the audio
  • adjust the volume
  • adjust the speed
  • close the player

Other screen readers

For those with vision impairments, we have endeavoured to maximise the ability to use a screen reader with this website. Visitors using recent versions of screen readers can navigate using the following keystrokes:

Headings
  • H to navigate forwards through the headings
  • Shift + H to navigate backwards through the headings
  • 1 to navigate to the next level 1 heading (or a number between 1 and 6 to navigate to the next heading on this level)
  • Shift + 1 to navigate to the previous level 1 heading (or a number between 1 and 6 to navigate to the previous heading on this level)
  • Insert + F6 to provide a list of all headings.
Links 

Press:

  • Tab key to proceed through the links or shift + tab to cycle backwards through the links
  • Insert + F7 to provide a list of all links.
Landmarks

Using JAWS® Versions 10-12, you can use the keyboard navigation in virtual mode:

  • ; (semicolon) for next landmark
  • Shift + ; (semicolon) for previous landmark
  • Ctrl + insert + ; (semicolon) for a list of landmarks

Using NVDA 2011.2 the landmark keyboard combination in virtual buffer mode:

  • D for next landmark
  • Shift + D for previous landmark.

Using NVDA + F7VoiceOver you can navigate a page via landmarks by:

  • Choosing landmarks in the web rotor, then finger flicking up or down to move to the next or previous landmark.

Alternative formats

Downloadable documents are provided in Portable Document Format (PDF) and reduced in size where possible.

If you require information in alternative formats, contact the City.

Disclaimer

Third party applications 

The City is not responsible for third party applications or how they access the information on the rockingham.wa.gov.au website, such as but not limited to, JAWS, NVDA, and ReadSpeaker screen readers, or other screen-reading software or devices.

PDFs

We are progressively optimising all of our Portable Document Format (PDF) documents and forms on this website to be made accessible and optimised for fast web use, in compliance with the WCAG 2.0 guidelines.

You will need Adobe Reader to open PDF files and it includes screen reading functionality.  It can be downloaded at Adobe.com for free. 

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