This accessibility statement applies to www.bas.ac.uk.
This website is run by British Antarctic Survey. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:
- zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
- navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
- navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
- listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)
AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.
How accessible this website is
We know some parts of this website are not yet fully accessible:
- You cannot modify the line height or spacing of text
- Most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
- Some video captions are auto generated and are not always correct
- The YouTube video player has accessibility issues with contrast and tooltips
- Some links do not have discernible text
- Not all frames have title attributes
- Some ARIA elements have not been implemented correctly
Feedback and contact information
If you need information on this website in a different format such as accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:
We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 14 days.
If you cannot view the map on our ‘contact us’ page, call us on 01223221500 or email us at basrec@bas.ac.uk. We can supply verbal instructions on how to get to our Cambridge office, or see our page on information on travel options/directions.
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, contact: BAS Service Desk, Web & Applications Team at the following email address: servicedesk@bas.ac.uk.
Enforcement procedure
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).
Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person
Find out how to contact us at our contact page.
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
British Antarctic Survey is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Compliance status
This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances and exemptions listed below.
Non-accessible content
The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.
Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations
Most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1 (non-text content). We plan to replace PDFs with a text-based alternative by march 2022.
Some of our older embedded videos do not have captions. This fails 1.2.2 Captions (Prerecorded) and (Video) 1.2.3 Audio Description or Media Alternative (Prerecorded). We have added auto-generated captions to our YouTube videos that do not have captions written by humans. We plan to add captions to all of our existing videos by March 2022.
Some links do not have discernible text. This fails 2.4.4 Link Purpose (In Context) and 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value (Link). We plan to rectify this by March 2022.
Not all frames have title attributes. This fails 2.4.1 Bypass Blocks (Frames) and 4.1.2: Name, Role, Value (Frames). We plan to rectify this by March 2022.
Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
Live video
We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.
What we’re doing to improve accessibility
The table below shows the items where our website fails to conform to the WCAG 2.1 AA guidelines and also has a timeline of when we aim to fix these issues.
| Target Date | Item | Status |
October 2020 | ARIA hidden element must not contain focusable elements – This has been spotted on the cookie notice which uses an incorrect/redundant method hiding with an ARIA property and CSS combined (Sitewide in cookie notice). | Complete |
October 2020 | ARIA attributes must confirm to valid values – The tabs interface doesn’t use correct ARIA properties which can cause confusion for users with assistive technology making a distinction between different visibility states, properties and role inheritance. | Complete |
October 2020 | Certain ARIA roles must container particular children – The carousel on the homepage uses ARIA properties incorrectly resulting in confusing and potentially a barrier to users with assistive technology from accessing content in the carousel (Carousel on homepage). | Complete |
October 2020 | Buttons must have discernible text – Throughout the site the button(s) highlighted has no discernible text and doesn’t used the correct code for a button: meaning that users with assistive technology may not be able to understand what this is for and unable to use it to search the site. (Sitewide in navigation search button) | Complete |
October 2020 | Elements must have sufficient colour contrast – Throughout the site many links have insufficient text colour with their background (Homepage, Navigation on tablet overflows). | Complete |
October 2020 | Focus indicator missing for skip to main content link – The skip to main content link isn’t visible on focus and remains hidden when using a keyboard to navigate the page (Homepage). | Complete |
October 2020 | Inaccessible by keyboard and no conforming alternate on carousel – The buttons which control the carousel aren’t accessible using a keyboard so therefore the contents within this section cannot be accessed without a mouse which is a dependency for users with vision or motor disabilities. (Images page carousel). | Complete |
October 2020 | Informative CSS image is missing text alternative – There are multiple icons without text for social media links (Sitewide in social media links). | Complete |
| October 2020 | For <input> elements must have labels – Ensures every form element has a label (People page) | Complete |
| October 2020 | IDs used in ARAIA and labels must be unique – Document has multiple elements referenced with ARIA with the same id attribute: newsDropdown (People page) | Complete |
September 2020 | Homepage <title> does not identify purpose of page – There appears to be a redundant hyphen preceding the website name here which screen readers will read out and may confuse users. | Complete |
June 2021 | Images must have alternate text – Fix by reviewing all featured images to have alternative text to relay information to blind users about the image’s contents and purpose. If the image is for decorative purposes only then check the code used here includes an empty ALT property (Sitewide). | Complete. We have taken steps to implement AI generated alt text by default on all new images that get added, these can then be overwritten by our admin users if the alt text is not fully suitable. We have also retrospectively added alt text to existing images using a combination of AI and manually checking. |
March 2022 | Ensure PDFs either are converted into or have a text-based alternative. | Ongoing |
March 2022 | <video> elements must have captions (Sitewide) | Ongoing |
March 2022
| Links must have discernible text (Sitewide) | Ongoing |
March 2022 | Frames must have title attribute – Iframe(s) missing a title attribute which is necessary to describe the contents inside when navigating the page using a screen reader (Sitewide). | Ongoing |
Preparation of this accessibility statement
This statement was prepared on 11/09/2020. It was last reviewed on 10/11/2021.
This website was last tested on 24/08/2020. The tests were carried out by The Dextrous Web Ltd (DXW).
When deciding on a sample of pages to test we started with our top 10 most visited pages over the last 12 months. We reviewed commonly used templates within those pages to maximise coverage. The following pages/templates have been tested using automated and manual tests: