Accessibility review of parliamentary parties’ websites
The political parties exclude people with disabilities from important information. This happens, embarrassingly, during the election of 2010, the year that EU and Sweden was meant to realise the vision of an accessible society for all. It constitutes a major democratic dilemma and borders on discrimination.
Accessibility means that all people, regardless of ability, should be able to access information and perform services. Funka has investigated the political parties' websites to see how they comply with international guidelines for accessibility. We do this every election year, on our own initiative, because we consider it an important democratic issue.
Major problems with accessibility
The political parties' websites are generally problematic for many groups of users. They are inconsistent and difficult to understand, pedagogically tricky and with unusual solutions. Several of them are also technically deficient, which means that users with assistive technology have great difficulties using them.
The target groups that may experience problems with these websites include persons with reading- and writing problems, people with motor problems, persons with concentration or cognitive problems, blind, visually impaired, elderly, immigrants and inexperienced users.
The report revealed serious shortcomings in terms of technology, pedagogics and language. We rank the parties and it is also possible to compare with the situation in 2006. Unfortunately, some of the problems we found this time were pointed out even back then.
Funding: Funka
Period: 2010