RE: New Guidelines in the UK

Thank you, Martin.  I am speaking at the University of California, Berkeley
Boalt Hall Law School this month on law and technology.  See
http://www.boalt.org/BDLS/confwaddellbio.htm.  One of my ongoing goals is to
educate the legal community and our CEO clients about the issues surrounding
accessible design of technologies.  It is especially important for all of us
to be informed about efforts underway around the globe.

Best regards,
Cynthia Waddell
---------------------------------------
Cynthia D. Waddell, JD
CIBER
Principal Consultant
Subject Matter Expert
Accessibility Center of Excellence
(800)547-5602 or Fax (800)228-8204

ACE Offices are located at San Jose, CA, Sacramento, CA and Raleigh, NC USA

San Jose Office:
PO BOX 5456
San Jose, California USA 95150-5456
http://www.icdri.org/cynthia_waddell.htm


-----Original Message-----
From: Martin Sloan [mailto:martin.sloan@orange.net]
Sent: Friday, March 01, 2002 2:07 AM
To: 'w3c-wai-ig@w3.org'
Subject: New Guidelines in the UK


Incidentally, the new draft of the Code of Practice that accompanies the
Disability Discrimination Act in the UK (and tries to shed light on what
all this legal nonsense means) was officially published yesterday (Wed 27
2002). This new Code expressly includes a reference to a Web site as an
online service (in this case an online booking site for an airline):

'Para 2.17 An airline company provides a flight reservation and booking
service to the public on its website. This is a provision of a service and
is subject to the Act'

Although the Code is not an authorative statement of the law, it provides
guidance for service providers and should also be considered by the Courts
when relevant (although there is no duty to follow it). However, I think we
can safely say that if and when a web accessibility case comes to court in
the UK the argument will now be even stronger. This is going to put me out
of a job...! :-/

For anyone who fancies reading it the Code is available from http://www.
drc.org.uk/drc/InformationAndLegislation/Page331a.asp

martin.
--
martin.sloan@orange.net
Glasgow Graduate School of Law

Received on Saturday, 2 March 2002 16:35:06 UTC