Accessibility

Access Keys

Most browsers support jumping to specific links by typing keys defined on a web site. On Windows, you can press 'ALT' and an access key followed by 'Enter' on Macintosh, you can press 'Control' and an access key. An access key is simply one of the number keys on your keyboard, usually along the top between the function keys and the letter keys.

All pages on this site define the following access keys:

• Access key 0 - Accessibility information
• Access key 1 - Home page
• Access key 2 - Latest News
• Access key 9 - Contact

Navigation Aids

Tab order has been defined on this site on every page. This means that by using the 'TAB' key on your keybord you can naviagte through the sites main content.

the 'TAB' keys cycle through the following items: logo (link to home page), main navigation, top navigation, links in page content

Links

Links on this website open in a seperate window and are checked regularly for any broken links.

Images

Images used on this site all have 'ALT' attributes added to them. Devices such as screen readers should be able to read the text attribute attached to each image. If you are viewing this site in Windows Explorer and you hover the mouse over any image, descriptive text of that image will appear. Note that design layout images have mostly been used as background graphics in the cascading style sheet, so will not have any 'ALT' attributes removing the need for visual elements to conflict with page content

Visual Design

• This site uses a combination of both tables and cascading style sheets for layout of content. Where possible visual content has been added as background elements so as not to interupt the main content of this site.
• NOTE: where tables have been used for specific data 'Captions' and 'Table Headers' have been used to format these tables in a logical order, so that such devices as screen readers should be able to interpret this information clearly.
• This site uses relative font sizes (as %) therefore visitors with impaired vision can use their browser settings to increase the font size on this site. In Windows Explorer go to View > Text Size from the top tool bar in your browser and choose your appropriate font size. For other browsers please refer to your help files for font size changes.
• This site has been created in such a way that if style sheets are not supported by your browser, the site can still be navigated and read

Standards Compliance

• This site meets the minimum W3C World Wide Web Consortium Guidleines for Accessibility - Priority One - Single 'A' rating

Stylesheets

The style sheet used to implement this website has been checked for compliancy agaist the W3C guidelines

Usability

This site has been designed for all visitors to enjoy and hopefully easily find their way around. The following fundemental web design usibility rules have been applied to the constuction of this site:

• Main site navigation appearing on the left side of all pages ( most familiar location for the majority websites) in contrasting text
• Navigation created to inform you of exactly where you are on the site at any one time.
• Main logo situated on the top left of the page ( most familiar location for the majority websites) and on all pages (other than the home page) is also a link to the home page

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