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Accessibility statement for Bury Council website

This statement applies to content published on the Bury.gov.uk website. It does not apply to content on other Bury Council websites (for example, The Bury Directory, Bury Means Business, Bury Markets, Foster With Bury, My Newsdesk as these sites will have their own accessibility statements).

This website is run by Bury Council. It is designed to be used by as many people as possible. The text should be clear and simple to understand. You should be able to:

  • zoom in up to at least 200% 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, for example, the latest versions of JAWS, VoiceOver, Narrator etc., some of which are free (such as NVDA)
  • view most of the website on mobile devices without you having to scroll from side to side

Ability Net has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

Visit Ability Net website for further information.

How accessible this website is

We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible. For example:

  • some form controls do not contrast sufficiently with the background, such as the search box which appears on every page
  • some pages (including the home page) contain adjacent links which go to the same URL
  • when tabbing through links on a page, some highlights make it difficult to read the link text (for example: tabbing through the footer links)
  • some links open pages in a new tab or window without telling you this is going to happen (for example: many links to online forms and external websites)
  • links to most documents open in a new tab or window without telling you this is going to happen
  • some pages have redundant links (multiple links going to the same webpage, straight after each other, as on the home page some links are present three times)
  • some pages contain tables which required horizontal scrolling to read all the data)
  • text on error pages is too small to read on mobile phones without zooming and scrolling
  • some of our systems pages (for example: library catalogue; online school admissions) may not be fully accessible
  • some pages and document attachments are not written in plain English
  • live Council meetings streamed for us on a different site, do not have captions
  • some of our older video content may not have captions
  • some of our online forms are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard
  • some of our online forms have instructional text which does not get read out by screen reader software
  • most older PDF documents and some newer PDF documents are not fully accessible:

Each department and section which publishes content on Bury.gov.uk is responsible for making sure it meets the accessibility regulations. We will update the statement when issues are fixed or when we expect them to be fixed.

Feedback and contact information

Contact details are available on many content pages on this site. These contact details change, depending on which web page you are on. Pages which do not have specific service related contact details will show our main contact details in the page footer.

If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF documents, large print, easy read, or audio recording, then please contact the section whose details appear on the page you require information about. We'll consider your request and get back to you in five working days.

In your message, include:

  • the web address (URL) of the content
  • the nature of your disability, if any
  • a description of the problem
  • your email address and name
  • the format you need - for example, plain text, large print, audio CD

You can also view the Accessibility statement for documents published on Bury Council website to report any problems or request documents in an alternative format.

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

If you find any problems that are not listed on this page or you think we're not meeting the accessibility requirements, contact us.

Enforcement procedure

If you contact us with a complaint and you're not happy with our response, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

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').


Technical information about this website's accessibility

Bury Council is committed to making this 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 W3.org - Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 AA standard.

Visit the W3.org - Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 website for more information.

Non-accessible content

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.

Non compliance with the accessibility regulations

  1. Some tables in content (especially in PDF documents) do not have table row headers when needed. This means assistive technologies will not read the tables correctly. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.1 (Info and Relationships).
  2. Some tables do not display properly on mobile devices and require the use of left and right scrolling or using the device on its side.
  3. Images on some pages do not always have suitable image descriptions. Users of assistive technologies may not have access to information conveyed in images. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1 (Non-text Content).
  4. Some pages cannot be found through more than one type of navigation. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.4.5 (Multiple Ways).
  5. Some documents have poor colour contrast. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.4.1 (Use of Colour).
  6. Many documents are in less accessible formats, for example PDF. Non-HTML documents published on or after 23 September 2018 must have an accessible format.

When we publish new content we'll make sure our use of images meets accessibility standards.

Note: There will occasionally be some images which are very temporary and contain information not needed to access Council services (for example, statistical data presented as graphs and charts) may not be compliant. Please contact us if you require such information in an accessible format.

PDFs and non-HTML documents

Many documents are not accessible in a number of ways including missing text alternatives and missing document structure.

View our accessible documents statement to report any problems with documents published on this website or request documents in an alternative format.

Interactive tools and transactions

Some of our interactive forms are difficult to navigate using a keyboard. For example, because some form controls are missing a 'label' tag. We are in the process of replacing forms which have these issues and plan to have them all fixed as they come up for review.

Many of our forms are built and hosted through third party software and 'skinned' to look like our website. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.1 (information and relationships).

Sub sites and third party sites

Some services are provided through this web site but are actually separate sites (often styled to look like this site). Many of these sites have some accessibility issues:

Sub site and third party site accessibility and usability issues
Site Issues (some minor issues are not listed)
Adult education courses Links in body use colour only, low contrast issues, course information PDF documents not mobile friendly
Benefit claim form Low contrast issues, no indication of mandatory fields (until end of page)
Bury archives online Skipped heading levels, empty headings, missing form labels, empty buttons, empty links, missing alt text, not mobile friendly
Bury Council payments (NSL) Missing form labels, empty links, low contrast issues, not fully mobile friendly
Bury leisure online No document language, empty links, skipped heading levels, suspicious link text (for example, click here), low contrast issues, use of non-compliant "capcha", redundant links, very small text, empty table header, missing fieldsets, links redirect to another website without informing user (and open new tab or window)
Bury licensing register Links in tables use colour only (or no colour differentiation), not fully mobile friendly
Bury support fund application Lists not tagged properly
Council Decisions (Your Councillors) No document language, missing form labels, unlabeled form control with title, multiple links with same name going to different web pages, missing alternative text on some images, PDFs do not meet accessibility standards (due to issues with tables, lists, heading structure, and others)
E-store - register and login page Linked images missing alternative text, missing form labels, low contrast issues, not mobile friendly
Library catalogue Missing form labels, missing fieldsets, empty table headers, empty links, low contrast issues, links only distinguishable by colour
Maps - Brownfield land register sites in Bury Missing form labels, empty form labels, no document language, empty buttons, not mobile friendly. underlines used for non-link text, justified text, suspicious alt text (for example, front page image)
Online land charges submission maps Missing alternative text, missing form labels, no document language, low contrast issues, not mobile friendly
Online schools admissions Missing form labels, no document language, low contrast, use of underlines when not a link, no heading structure, links use colour only when in body of text, block capitals used
Planning - Applications Image buttons missing alternative text, linked images missing alternative text, missing form labels, document language missing, empty table headers, low contrast issues
Planning portal - Fee calculator Missing form labels, no document language

The table above will be updated as we test and review each of these systems.


Content that is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

PDF and other documents

Non-HTML documents published before September 2018 do not need to be accessible - unless users need them to use a service. To report any problems or request documents in an alternative format, visit our accessible documents statement page.

Live video

Live video streams do not have captions. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.2.4 (captions - live). We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt in the accessibility regulations.


How we tested this website

We use the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines V2.2 level A and level AA to test how accessible this website is.

This website was designed and tested in 2023. We test sample pages at regular intervals using accessibility tools such as Wave and Accessibility Insights. Visit Wave - Web AIM web accessibility evaluation tool, and Accessibility Insights.

We also test:

  • all new page templates that we introduce
  • system pages, styled to look like our site
  • online forms

This statement was prepared on 22 March 2023. It was last updated on 20 June 2023.