A presentation for IAG staff for the "Future is here" event on 6 May 20202. This presentation covers three topics - "What are our legal responsibilities around accessibility?", "What is WCAG?", and "What is inclusive design?"

1. What is WCAG
And why should you care?

2. Hey there, I’m Russ.
I manage the Chroma Design
System. I work in the Design Centre,
within “Strategy and Innovation”.

3. In this presentation, I’ll be looking at
three questions.

4. 1. What are our legal responsibilities
around accessibility?
2. What is WCAG?
3. What is inclusive design?

5. 1. What are our legal
responsibility around
accessibility?

6. Did you know that around 1 in 5
Australians have some form of
disability?
http://www.and.org.au/pages/disability-statistics.html

7. This ratio increases with age.
For people 65 years and older, around
2 in 5 people have some form of
disability.

8. From a financial and ethical
perspective, we should be making
our sites and apps accessible to the
widest possible audience.

9. But what about our legal
responsibilities?

10. Under the Disability Discrimination
Act 1992, companies must ensure
that people with disabilities have the
same fundamental rights to access
information and services as others in
the community.
http://www.comlaw.gov.au/Series/C2004A04426

11. But what about digital information and
services? The “internet” didn’t really
become mainstream till around 1994.

12. That’s where the Australian Human
Rights Commission comes into play.

13. The Australian Human Rights
Commission requires that all websites
and web resources must comply with
WCAG 2.0 to a minimum of AA-Level
conformance.”
http://www.humanrights.gov.au/world-wide-web-access-disability-
discrimination-act-advisory-notes-ver-41-2014

14. In simple terms, this means that all of
IAG’s public facing digital products
are legally required to be “accessible”.

15. Companies can be legally
challenged by “customers” who are
not able to access their services
adequately.

16. This not an idle threat. Numerous
large companies have had to face
accessibility-related legal action
over the last 20 years or more.

17. It all began with “Maguire v SOCOG”
way back in 1999.
https://www.humanrights.gov.au/our-work/disability-rights/maguire-v-socog

18. But what do the terms “WCAG” and
“AA” actually mean?

19. 2. What is WCAG?

20. The term “WCAG” is the abbreviation
for “Web Content Accessibility
Guidelines”.

21. These guidelines were developed to
provide a single shared standard for
web content accessibility.

22. The current standard is Web Content
Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)
2.1, which became a W3C
Recommendation in June 2018.

23. At the core of these WCAG 2.1
guidelines there are 78 success
criteria.

24. Each of the 78 success criteria are
defined with a compliance level of
either “A", “AA” or “AAA”.

25. Level A checkpoints have the
greatest impact on a broad range of
user populations. These checkpoints
are also often the easiest to address.

26. ?
An example of a Level A criteria would
be making sure that captions are
available with all audio content.

27. !
Captions are critical for deaf or hard of
hearing people when watching videos
or listing to audio files.

28. Level AA checkpoints will also have
a high impact for users. Sometimes
only specific user populations will be
impacted. However, the impact is
important.

29. ?
An example of a Level AA criteria
would be making sure that audio
descriptions are provided with all
audio content.

30. !
Audio descriptions are critical for blind
people who cannot see what is
happening in videos. These users may
need aspects of the video described
in a separate audio track.

31. Level AAA checkpoints are often
focused on improvements for very
specific user populations. These
checkpoints are often the most
difficult to address.

32. ?
An example of a Level AAA criteria
would be making sure that sign
language interpretation is provided
with all audio content.

33. !
Sign language presented in the corner
of videos is critical for hearing-
impaired users who understand sign
language but cannot read English, and
therefore cannot understand captions.

34. But how does this work in the real
world?

35. Accessibility experts conduct audits
of websites and applications using
these 78 success criteria.

36. Each aspect of the website or
application can be reviewed and
determined if it passes or fails each
of the success criteria.

37. The overall result helps to determine if
the website or application conforms
to WCAG 2.1 guidelines and is
therefore considered “accessible”.

38. In reality, most IAG staff do not need
to focus on WCAG success criteria.

39. However, all of us should be focussed
on “inclusive design”.

40. 3. What is inclusive
design?

41. The easiest way to understand the
difference between “inclusive design”
and “accessibility” is to imagine
designing a playground for young
kids.

42. One method would be to design the
playground and then during or after
the build process, fix things so they
are more accessible.

43. That’s accessibility.

44. Another way would be to think about
including the widest possible range
of users in every step of the process.

45. 1. When creating the personas
(people likely to use the playground).

46. 2. When conducting interviews with
kids to find out what they like.

47. 3. When ideating.

48. 4. When testing and evaluating.

49. 5. When building.

50. Inclusive design is about considering
the needs of all people at every
stage of the process.

51. But can it be taken one step further?

52. In an ideal world, we should work
“with”, not “for” people with
disabilities.

53. Going back to our our kids park
analogy, this would mean including
people with disabilities in the
discussion, planning and
development.

54. Not just as an audience type to be
tested, but as experts with valuable
opinions.

55. Why? Lived experience.

56. People who live with disabilities have
a much better understanding as to
their needs and have valuable input.

57. The challenge?

58. While you probably don’t have to
focus on WCAG success criteria in
your job, you can still make a
difference.

59. Everyone in IAG can make “inclusive
design” part of our ways of working -
in everything that we do.

60. If you are interested in finding out how
this can be done, myself and many
others in IAG are happy to help.

61. Finally, a quick plug for Global
Accessibility Awareness Day 2020 -
21 May 2020.

62. GLOBAL ACCESSIBILITY
AWARENESS DAY 2020
Find the menu of your
favourite restaurant online
Locate the Critical
Incident telephone number
on the Vine
Send an email to one of
your colleagues
How does it work?
Unplug your mouse and using only your keyboard,
try to complete the three simple tasks below.
Do you think you could work without your
mouse or touchpad?
Challenge
No Mouse

63. Thank you