The report presents the impact evaluation of the European Directive that regulates the accessibility of public sector websites and apps (Web Accessibility Directive).
Web accessibility is essential for an inclusive society and public sector bodies are called to make all the necessary efforts to ensure that the digitisation processes are fair, equitable and inclusive. The European Directive 2016/2102 on web accessibility (Web Accessibility Directive, WAD), which came into force in 2016, requires Member States to adapt public sector bodies’ websites and apps with respect to minimum accessibility requirements.
The European Commission has recently published the support study for the impact assessment of the Directive which covers the first three years of application. The study was carried out by Open Evidence together with other partners (Intellera Consulting and Funka), analysing the results emerging from different consultation activities and the national monitoring of websites and apps. The study clearly shows that the Directive has been a significant step forward towards more accessible websites and apps, but there are still some challenges at national level to make the monitoring more effective.
For the first time, the public consultation on the Directive has also been published in a simplified format (easy-to-read) to allow people with particularly significant disabilities to provide feedback on the results achieved by the Directive. Likewise, the study’s final report was published following international accessibility standards and in a simplified format.
The report is available here.