Join Natalie and Natalie for the tenth episode of the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast, where they discuss various accessibility laws around the world.
Natalie Garza: Hello, everybody, and welcome to the AAAdvark Accessibility Podcast. My name is Natalie G. I’m an accessibility novice, and in today’s episode we have our guest
Natalie MacLees: Natalie MacLees, accessibility expert
Natalie Garza: and we’re going to be talking about accessibility laws, at least the very popular ones.
Natalie MacLees: around the world.
Natalie Garza: yes, around the world, we’re not just going to talk about the U.S., we’re going to talk about some other popular ones. So, to get started, what accessibility law do you feel kickstarted a lot of these?
Natalie MacLees: Hmm, I wonder what it could be.
Natalie MacLees: So a lot of disability laws around the world have their basis in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities passed by the United Nations in 2006 or the UN CRPD. And I have a nice quote from that law.
Natalie MacLees: All right, so the UN CRPD guarantees many rights for persons with disabilities. But one of the main things that applies to websites is this nice little quote that “access to information and communication is seen as a precondition for freedom of opinion and expression”.
Natalie Garza: Mm hmm. Yes, because in 2006, you started seeing a lot more internet usage.
Natalie MacLees: For sure. Yeah, we were about 10 years into the internet being relatively commonly used by people in 2006.
Natalie Garza: yeah. I feel like that’s around the time a lot of people started getting computers in their homes.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah,
Natalie MacLees: Before that it was a lot of early adopters. But, yeah, by the early 2000s. It was really common to just have internet in your house and a computer that was connected to the internet.
Natalie Garza: Yeah, the computer room.
Natalie MacLees: The computer room. I had a computer room.
Natalie Garza: Me too, we had our first computer room around that time.
Natalie MacLees: Because your computer needed a whole room because it was enormous.
Natalie Garza: It had its dedicated spot. All right, so based on the United Nations, Do you want to hop over to the United States?
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, we can quickly run through some of the important federal legislation, which is not comprehensive at all, because lots of states and local governments have passed their own accessibility laws, but kind of the important ones for us federal law is the Americans with Disabilities Act, which was passed in 1990 and where things get a little bit messy with the ADA.
Natalie MacLees: Obviously in 1990, the Internet didn’t exist yet. We were just a little too early. And so there’s no language in the bill itself that refers to websites and it’s been actually kind of contentious over the years on whether or not the ADA actually applies to websites or not. And there was a case involving Domino’s pizza and the ability of people who screen readers to be able to order pizzas on their app or on their website.
Natalie MacLees: But aside from that, there hasn’t really been any clear there haven’t been any clear court case decisions, and the Supreme Court has mostly declined to hear important ADA websites. , Cases, so we’re still in a little bit of a state of uncertainty, and then I think it was about 2 years ago, the Department of Justice finally did publish some guidelines saying that, yes, they thought that WCAG 2.0 AA did apply to websites. We don’t really know if that is going to stick until it’s challenged in a court case. So there’s still a little bit of a question there. And we should also say neither of us are lawyers. So we’re not offering any kind of legal advice or anything like that. We’re just doing a quick overview of these laws.
Natalie Garza: Yes. Yes. Yes. We are not lawyers
Natalie MacLees: Definitely not. There’s no law school here. , The other big federal law in the U.S. is the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. And you might think, wait, There weren’t websites in 1990. Now she’s talking about 1973,
Natalie MacLees: but the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, Section 508, just says that when the federal government procures any kind of communications technology that it has to be accessible, and the law was very general about that, and a website is definitely a communication technology, so that law definitely does apply to websites and other kinds of Internet technology as well.
Natalie MacLees: And then there’s also a Section 504 of that act, which extends that criteria. So it also applies to institutions that receive federal funding must have accessible websites. So those are the, the big like national ones in the United States, but of course, there are literally like hundreds, if not thousands of others in the U.S. accessibility laws all over the place.
Natalie Garza: Oh, really, just like at different levels of government
Natalie MacLees: Yeah. Different states have them, different cities, counties, et cetera. Yeah.
Natalie Garza: I want to backtrack to the ADA.
Natalie MacLees: Okay.
Natalie Garza: Is there hesitation in not being clear with WCAG standards just because it will get messy? Like, if they just suddenly declare, like, WCAG 2.0 for these websites, now they have to enforce it, now they have all these new cases coming in?
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, one of the tricky things with the ADA is that the only real enforcement built into it is lawsuits. So, if a disabled person is unable to access a service, they have the right to file a lawsuit. There’s no other enforcement. Like, you’re not going to get a ticket from the government, right, saying you have to pay a fine if your website isn’t accessible.
Natalie MacLees: That’s just, it’s not how that law is enforced. And so it’s all about which lawsuits get through and which lawsuits are successful and how those decisions are made, and how the precedent gets set.
Natalie Garza: Mhm. So, by leaving it muddy, they have less lawsuits, basically.
Natalie MacLees: The part of it that’s muddy is that it says that the law applies to, it is like a quote from the law is places of public accommodation. So, a shop that’s open to the general public is a place of public accommodation. And that’s not under question like that’s been decided over and over again in lawsuits.
Natalie MacLees: The question is, is a website a place of public accommodation? And there have been decisions that say yes it is, and there have been decisions that say no they aren’t. No, they are not, at different levels of the courts, right, because of course we have many levels of federal courts but we’re, we’re waiting for the Supreme Court to make a decision that says either yes, they are or no, they aren’t before we actually know for sure.
Natalie Garza: Okay. But if they eventually do add that, it would fall under ADA still.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, for sure. Yeah.
Natalie Garza: just have to make a clarification.
Natalie MacLees: They need to make some clarifications. Yes. And unfortunately, the way things work right now, those clarifications are getting made by lawsuit decisions, which is a little messy.
Natalie Garza: You know what I just realized? The internet doesn’t have police.
Natalie MacLees: No, it sure doesn’t. It doesn’t have borders. It doesn’t have police. It’s the wild, wild west out here. Look it, we’ll let anybody have a podcast.
Natalie Garza: Yeah, so, like if a website is not accessible, they can’t just get a ticket. There’s no little police flagging you.
Natalie MacLees: No,
Natalie Garza: Pull over. Pull over.
Natalie MacLees: no. Yeah, and there’s no, right, like you put up a website, anybody in the world can get to it. So like what country’s laws apply to it? You don’t need to go get a license or a permit to have a website. Anybody can set up a website.
Natalie Garza: Yeah. That’s an interesting problem because aside from lawsuits, what other ways could you really enforce that?
Natalie MacLees: It’s really hard.
Natalie Garza: If you’re watching on YouTube and you have any good ideas, leave them in the comments below. I’m curious to see what everyone else thinks. I don’t think we should have internet police.
Natalie MacLees: No, I don’t think we should have internet police either.
Natalie Garza: It’s an interesting question. think about it. And then I think for the Rehabilitation Act, I had a question. no, not a question. I would say that there are a lot more federally funded organizations than you would think because I didn’t realize universities were involved.
Natalie MacLees: Sure. Education at all levels, really, not just universities, all kinds of high schools, elementary schools, kindergartens, preschools. Yep. Almost all of them receive some kind of federal funding. Yeah.
Natalie Garza: I wanted to just throw that out there, because it’s more common than that, you would expect.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah. And a lot of nonprofit organizations receive a significant amount of federal funding.
Natalie Garza: Oh yes, that’s true.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, yeah, it is way more than you would expect.
Natalie Garza: All right, that’s the U. S., you guys. We still have a bunch more others to go through, so let’s
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, but we’ll go faster because we don’t live there and we know less.
Natalie Garza: Yeah, we’re not international lawyers either, if you guys are wondering.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah.
Natalie Garza: All right, what about the European Union? Do you want to go over that one?
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, we’ll talk about that one real quick because the EU has a big accessibility act that is going into Becoming active, I guess, in June of this year. So just a few months from now, it was passed in 2019, but, you know, humans are bad at planning. So I think a lot of people are going to be scrambling in these last few months, but it does require that.
Natalie MacLees: Digital and physical goods and services are accessible, including things like ATMs, websites, ticketing machines, kiosks, and things like that. And that is WCAG 2. 1
Natalie Garza: if you guys need to scramble and get your website audited and remediated, stick around to the end and we’ll let you know what you can do. Yes, but I wrote a little note, that’s a little baby act, it was just born. I feel like
Natalie MacLees: Brand new. Yep.
Natalie Garza: a while.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah. For sure.
Natalie Garza: Let’s go over Canada.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah. Canada. So Ontario actually kicked off Canada’s laws. They had an AODA law, but now they have a federal law, Accessible Canada Act. Came around in 2019. They want a barrier-free Canada by 2040. Which is a lovely goal to have, and that applies to federally regulated organizations, so not actually government institutions, but things like banks and things like that are also included in that law and must have accessible websites, accessible apps, things like that, and they do have.
Natalie MacLees: a penalty from the government if they don’t comply. Much less litigious country than the U.S.
Natalie Garza: yeah. So they do have an internet police? Yes.
Natalie MacLees: I guess kind of.
Natalie Garza: Yeah, and the penalties can reach up to 250,000 Canadian bacons.
Natalie MacLees: Canadian bacons.
Natalie Garza: Mm hmm. Kidding. Canadian dollars. All right.
Natalie MacLees: UK, is famously no longer part of the EU.
Natalie Garza: I didn’t know that.
Natalie MacLees: You don’t remember all the Brexit drama?
Natalie Garza: Mm mm. No, was that recently?
Natalie MacLees: Oh, they were in the EU, and they left. Yes, it was recently.
Natalie MacLees: I don’t know. Maybe it was 10 years ago?
Natalie Garza: Oh, Natalie, come on. Not recently.
Natalie MacLees: All right, well, they were in the EU and now they’re not, so they have their own law. That says websites and mobile apps have to adhere to WCAG 2.1 AA. And that applies to government and public sector websites.
Natalie Garza: So the UK enacted it in 2010, so it was before they separated from the United Nations.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, I think that would have been before. Cause I think it was around like 2015 or so that they separated.
Natalie Garza: Okay,
Natalie MacLees: I remember correctly.
Natalie Garza: Do you think that their Equality Act kind of got grandfathered in by the United Nations? Oh wait,
Natalie MacLees: Oh lot. Lots of the countries that are in the EU have their own accessibility law that applies to just their country in addition to this new one that’s going into effect this year. In fact, most of them already had some kind of accessibility law. Yeah.
Natalie Garza: Cause the United Nations was in 2006 and then the UK. Yeah. I’m getting confused with the timelines now. United Nations 2006 UK, yeah.
Natalie MacLees: The CRPD, you mean?
Natalie Garza: Yeah.
Natalie MacLees: Yes.
Natalie Garza: And then unite the UK 2010 with their own law on top of the United Nations
Natalie MacLees: On top of CRPD? Yeah.
Natalie Garza: and then they broke off, but they just kept their own law.
Natalie MacLees: Well, the United Nations, the CRPD isn’t a law. And it’s just basically a statement of rights that people with disabilities have. And the UN, right, has very limited ability to impose laws on the countries that belong to the UN. It’s just kind of all the countries agreeing, like, yes, we all agree that this is, that this is the case.
Natalie Garza: Yes, that is true, the United Nations is not supposed to impose laws. European viewers I’m so sorry, I’m very ill-informed on world policies and laws!
Natalie MacLees: Yeah.
Natalie Garza: Okay, but I hope that timeline made sense to everyone. That’s how I was kind of thinking about it, like, wait, what is going on? Alright,
Natalie MacLees: Okay. All right. I see.
Natalie Garza: Next is Australia.
Natalie MacLees: Australia. Yay. Australia’s Disability Discrimination Act, or the DDA, came around in 1992, and WCAG 2.1 AA for digital content for websites and apps is included under goods and services. So, it helps guarantee access to employment, information, education, et cetera.
Natalie Garza: I wonder if areas of employment kind of applies to LinkedIn and Indeed.
Natalie MacLees: Oh, I’m sure, yeah, job application processes that are all online now. Yeah, those all need to be accessible.
Natalie Garza: Interesting. So, in cases like that, would the Australian government reach out to LinkedIn and Indeed? Like public companies like that?
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, that’s where it gets hard because there’s no internet police, right? Because LinkedIn isn’t an Australian company. So, they would not typically be under any kind of jurisdiction for Australian laws. But if their website is accessible in Australia, Do the Australian laws apply?
Natalie Garza: Leave your comment below. We’d like to know.
Natalie MacLees: That’s where it gets a little bit messy, right? The internet doesn’t have borders, it doesn’t have police, it doesn’t have laws. So how do we, how do we enforce these things? How is the EU going to enforce all the other websites that people access in the EU that are not companies based in the EU?
Natalie MacLees: You can still go, you know, eBay is an American company, but if I’m in Germany, I can go on eBay and I can buy stuff.
Natalie Garza: And then, on top of that, you have VPNs. Right?
Natalie MacLees: Yeah, you can trick a website into thinking you’re somewhere that you’re not.
Natalie Garza: Anyway.
Natalie MacLees: But there are many, many, many, many others. So this is Western Europe and most of the English-speaking world, but there are Laws in many, many, many other countries. So we’ll we’ll include a link to Lainey Feingold’s repository of information on laws, disability laws around the world.
Natalie Garza: We’ll put a link in the description below. She has a huge long list of all the countries that include accessibility laws and more information and links to resources, if you’re curious. So, we went over some of the laws. How does this impact websites? Like, what should website owners keep in mind?
Natalie MacLees: Well, if you’re a U.S.-based company, you need to keep in mind that if your website is not accessible, somebody might try to sue you because that is how we enforce the ADA. So you do want to make sure that your website is accessible. I don’t think to me. That’s more important to do because it’s helpful for people, and you want to do the right thing and provide equal access to information and services for everybody, regardless of their ability.
Natalie MacLees: And that’s the more important reason to do it. But there is also a legal reason that you would want to make sure that your websites are accessible. There’s around one in four people in the United States has some kind of disability. So I can’t think of any business that doesn’t want to increase business by 25%.
Natalie MacLees: So that’s another good reason to go ahead and do it.
Natalie Garza: And not only that, I mean, overall, accessibility improvements, they improve it for everybody visiting your site.
Natalie MacLees: They do. Yeah, it improves the user experience for everybody and gives you better SEO.
Natalie Garza: Yep. Who doesn’t want better search engine results? All right, the last thing I will mention is that we’ll link to the Robles versus Domino’s case in the description below. And with that, we will end the podcast with some information on where you can go if you’re curious about making your website accessible.
Natalie MacLees: Yeah. If you want to find out how you’re doing and what your website might look like, you can go to AAAdvarkaccessibility.com and try AAAdvark for free on your homepage. It’ll run an automated scan and let you know about some accessibility issues on there. If you’re an accessibility professional, we also have some nice tools for conducting manual audits.
Natalie MacLees: Make it easier to record issues that you find and track them through to resolution.
Natalie Garza: So, with that, thank you guys for watching this podcast. We covered accessibility laws, the really popular ones that we, in English-speaking countries, there’s a lot more, so go check them out. yeah, that’s about it. That’s our 10th episode we’re signing off. That’s it. Join us next time for another episode of the AAAdvark Accessibility Podcast.
