Intersteno E-News 92

ENEWS 92 | 5
I’m deaf, not stupid!
(Digital accessibility and client panels in the House of
Representatives of the Netherlands)
By Henk-Jan Eras
Photo: On Thursday 19 December 2019, the House of Representatives debated the UN Convention on
the Rights of People with Disabilities. The debate was subtitled live and writing interpreters were
present in the public gallery.
In these difficult times, when fighting the corona virus means that social distancing becomes the new
normal, communication is heading online. Digital accessibility in general is more important now than
ever.
In this article the term digital accessibility is about making information and services as useful for
people with disabilities as they are for people without disabilities. This is called equal accessibility.
Think of users who are deaf, hard of hearing, blind, visually impaired or color blind. Think also of
people who are autistic, have dyslexia or a short working memory. And of anyone who can't use a
mouse or touchscreen because, for example, they have a motor impairment, vibrate or for some other
reason need to use the keyboard or other equipment.
Equal
The ambition is: users with a disability should be able to use applications and websites of the House of
Representatives in the Netherlands in an equal way. In this context, in the Netherlands the “Stichting
Accessibility”( Accessibility Foundation) tests annually whether these websites and applications
comply with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.1). See:
http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/. A guideline is: Captions are provided for all live audio content in