Re: Access Board and government regulations

For Australia, you could look through the site of the Human Rights and Equal
Opportunities Commission - http://www.hreoc.gov.au

My very rough interpretation (I'm not a lawyer...):
The standards applied are based in large part on the notion of "non
discrimination", with an exemption available to certain parties on the
grounds of unreasonable hardship or infringement of personal rights (my loose
paraphrase) - for example non-government organisations can claim exemption on
the basis that not discriminating is too expensive in practise, and people
who employ someone in their own home are exempted from at least some of the
rules. When it comes down to it, a lot is based on precedent and "reasonable
person" type decisions. At the Web Accessibility Summit held in Melbourne
recently, Graham Innes (the deputy commissioner responsible for disabilities)
said that HREOC suggested following the WCAG as a way to avoid discriminating
against people, but in response to a question explained that this was not
proof of accessibility, but proof of intent (which is important in some types
of case) and the best practical advice the commission had. The commission has
been following the work of WAI for longer than I have, at least.

(As I understand it, a similar situation applies in Australian states).

Cheers

Charles

On Mon, 18 Dec 2000, Jon Gunderson wrote:

  Kynn,
  The access board is the place to look for how federal standards are set,
  which often form the basis for ADA type legislation that apply to the
  general public.

  http://www.access-board.gov/

  They are currently publishing new rules (December 21st) on electronic and
  information technologies that will affect any entity that receives federal
  support or contracts.  Part of the specifications will include information
  on web site accessibility.  There guidelines are much more functional
  requirements than technical requirements, at least in the last public version.

  http://www.access-board.gov/sec508/508index.htm


  Hope this helps,
  Jon
  Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
  Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
  Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
  MC-574
  College of Applied Life Studies
  University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
  1207 S. Oak Street, Champaign, IL  61820

  Voice: (217) 244-5870
  Fax: (217) 333-0248

  E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu

  WWW: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund
  WWW: http://www.w3.org/wai/ua



-- 
Charles McCathieNevile    mailto:charles@w3.org    phone: +61 (0) 409 134 136
W3C Web Accessibility Initiative                      http://www.w3.org/WAI
Location: I-cubed, 110 Victoria Street, Carlton VIC 3053, Australia
September - November 2000:
W3C INRIA, 2004 Route des Lucioles, BP 93, 06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex, France

Received on Monday, 18 December 2000 11:06:26 UTC