Season 01 | Episode 06: Accessibility Legislation
In this episode: David and Sandi discuss accessibility from around the world with Jennifer Curry Jahnke, Principal Consultant at AccessibilityConsulting.ca. We explore how legislation is shaping the future of accessible practices and what small businesses can do to stay ahead.
Transcript
David: Welcome to Practical Accessibility Insights. I’m David Best, bringing you another engaging conversation, and with me is my co host, Sandi Gauder. Hi, Sandi.
Sandi: Hi, David. How are you today?
David: I’m good. You know, I was thinking about this series we’re doing now on accessibility, and I was wondering, the terms accessibility has a lot of different meanings.
Has the definition of accessibility changed for you over the years as a small business owner?
Sandi: Oh, that’s a very good question. I know that in the field that we’re in, in over the years of web development, people often think accessibility is “oh, I can get to a website” or “I have access through my mobile phone because my service provider lets me in”.
It’s interesting to me that it has that other connotation because when I think of accessibility, I think about things being accessible for all without barriers. So has it changed over the years? I’m not so sure that it has for me specifically, but I’ve certainly become more aware of how other people think about the word and what it means to them.
David: In this episode, the first podcast in a four part series, we’re going to talk about legislation. Accessibility legislation is about changing social behaviours to establish a new normalization. The same as the seatbelt laws that were established to change behaviour towards safer travel. And no smoking laws were established to change the social behaviour in establishing a new normalization for health.
So like that, accessibility legislation is to change the social behaviour toward greater inclusion. Sandi, why don’t you introduce our guest for today and let’s get started in getting our listeners to learn more about accessibility.
Sandi: I am pleased to welcome Jennifer Curry Jahnke to our episode today. Hi, Jennifer.
Jennifer: Hi, Sandi.
Sandi: Before we get into grilling you with all sorts of questions, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself? Just, you know, who you are, what you do, what your background is, all that kind of stuff.
Jennifer: Thank you. I am the principal consultant, educator, and researcher with AccessibilityConsulting.ca.
We are a collective of digital accessibility educators, which Sandi is a member of. We work with academic institutions and organizations to not only meet their accessibility legislative compliance requirements, but also to help them determine how mature their organization is in being accessible. We conduct usability research. And we support the development and delivery of educational and training materials.
I’m also currently the Digital Accessibility Manager at a large UK university, a member of the AODA’s Post Secondary Standards Accessibility Committee, and a previous member of the Accessible Canada Act’s ICT Standards Development Committee.
Sandi: So, one of the reasons that I thought you might be the right fit for this episode is your involvement with some of the legislative standards committees. Certainly when you were teaching in the postgraduate certificate program, you covered a lot about legislation for your students. So, I’m hoping that you can give us just an overview of the different legislation that is out there that would impact our listeners, whether they’re in Canada, States, even in Europe.
Jennifer: So when we look at legislative standards, we’re looking at a set of rules or best practices made by the government to determine what organizations have to follow in order to be compliant or legal with these standards so that nationally and globally. We’re following a similar set of standards so that organizations don’t have to comply with different standards across different legislative boundaries.
So here in Ontario, we have to meet the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, or the AODA, that came into place in 2005, and states that we will be an accessible province by 2025. As the first province, we sort of set the standard for accessibility best practices, and most of the other provinces have now followed suit.
In Canada as a whole, nationally, we, in 2019, introduced the Accessible Canada Act, which, uh, tries to harmonize the provinces so that we’re all sort of following a similar act. Now the Accessible Canada Act applies to federal organizations or anybody that wants to do business with the federal government.
What they’ve done is they have looked nationally as well as globally to determine how to move forward with those standards. And they’ve looked to best practices south of the border in the United States, where they have the Americans with Disabilities Act, and they’ve looked to Europe where they had the EN 301549.
Just a really nice way of saying their accessibility act for information and communication technology. In Europe, though, they have several different accessibility acts across their members of the European Union. And so in order to harmonize. them, they are introducing the European Accessibility Act, which will come into full effect in June of next year.
And so there’s a variety of different legislation, depending on where you are and where you have to abide by or where you’re doing business with, but for the most part, they’ve tried to harmonize those acts so that businesses don’t have to pick and choose where they’re doing business. But there’s still a little bit of that that happens.
David: So can you give us a couple of practical examples of what the accessibility legislation might cover?
Jennifer: So in Ontario we have five standards. We have the Employment Standard, the Built Environment Standard, the Transportation Standard, the Information and Communication Standard, and the Customer Service Standard.
In addition, we have two proposed standards, which are the Health Standard and the Post-Secondary Education Standard. So depending on the type of business you do, whether you’re a public or not for profit organization, whether you’re a small or a large organization, you’ll have to meet different requirements under those standards.
Then, depending on the other provinces, they have, for the most part, very similar standards that are under the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act. However, some have made them their initial standards. For example, in British Columbia, they have a Post-Secondary Standard that’s part of their act already, where we’ve only proposed it in Ontario.
Across globally, it’s a little bit different. For the most part, the Information and Communication Standard is a very typical one that we’ll find, where most of the standards will reference the guidelines of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines for websites and mobile applications. Now, depending on the version, whether it’s WCAG 2.0, 2.1 or 2.2 will depend on the nation and where they’re at.
So, for example, the AODA states that Ontarians have to meet WCAG 2.0. Accessible Canada Act, which is adopted, the Europeans EN 301549, states that we have to meet WCAG 2.1, where in the U. S. they are moving to 2.1 depending on the size of organization, either in 2026 or 2027.
And in the UK they follow the P-S-B-A-R legislation and it states that they have to meet the most recent WCAG criteria, which is WCAG 2.2. So again, depending on where you’re at, will depend on the legislation you have to meet.
David: So each of the five standards have their own set of rules that need to be followed.
With regard to the communication standards, can you give us some ideas what kind of things small business owners should think about when they’re creating websites and social media?
Jennifer: Yeah, so when we look at the AODA’s Information and Communication Standard, there’s a variety of things that they have to meet.
One is WCAG 2.0, but it doesn’t apply to audio description or live recorded videos. But they do have to ensure that their website is 2.0 compliant, so they have to have things like a proper heading structure, it has to be keyboard navigable, they have to ensure that their images have alternative text, and their pre recorded videos have captions.
Sandi: Is that enough, would you say?
Jennifer: No, I’d say that 2.0 is quite outdated, and I know that the AODA’s Information and Communication Standards Committee has made recommendations to ensure that the government is following up to date standards, so they’ve recommended the government change that to increase it to at least 2.1, and that would harmonize it with the Accessible Canada Act, but that has not moved forward under this current government.
And even then, just following the WCAG guidelines isn’t always enough to make a site accessible. Legislation can only go so far. It’s always recommended that organizations meet with their user groups and members of the disability community to ensure that they are creating environments that are accessible for all.
David: So legislation is really about changing attitudes and setting a normalization for social behaviour. As an educator, I’m interested to know what you think about the standards for the communications, because it all seems very natural and quite common for me to think that proper page structure, headings and content is just something should be natural.
Why is it we have so many websites today that don’t follow those rules when it comes to small business? We have people coming out of colleges and universities not having any idea about these common features.
Jennifer: Yeah, I think that’s a great question, David. And really, the ultimate answer is that we haven’t introduced these concepts early enough into the education stream.
Really, if we were to look at, for example, the built environment and how we train our, you know, our architects, we should be teaching them about universal design and ensuring that, you know, there’s equal access to a building, whether that be through you know, the doorways, the stairs, the ramps, whether it’s elevators or escalators, that access is built in right from the beginning, because having to go in and retrofit that building to make it accessible is so much more expensive and time consuming after the fact.
And the same goes for websites. That we’re not teaching our content editors and our content authors to create accessible content and environments right from the very beginning. Where do they get that education? They’re having to, you know, either get it by accident when they’re told that the environment isn’t accessible and it’s not meeting the legislative requirements or they take courses on their own. It’s not built into the education system like it should be.
Sandi: It seems that there’s a lot of different standards across different jurisdictions. If I were a small business and we’re in a global world where we do business all over the place now. I know I should pay attention to the legislation in my own jurisdiction, whether I’m in the province of Ontario or in the States or wherever I am.
Knowing that there’s all different ways that this legislation has been crafted around the world how do you simplify that? How do you get to the, the, the essence of all these different pieces of legislation and say, okay, well, if you just do this, you should be good?
Jennifer: All of the legislations that I’ve mentioned all reference the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines as their main best practices for creating accessible environments.
So following the W3C, The World Wide Web Consortium’s guidelines, WCAG, would probably be the most simplest way of ensuring that you’re being compliant. That responsibility should be on those that are helping you to create the websites through the procurement process, that you should be asking them to ensure that they are WCAG compliant.
And I would always go to the most recent level. So at this point in time, it’s WCAG 2.2 to ensure that the environments and content that they are creating for you are fully compliant.
Sandi: So as a business owner, that all sounds like mumbo jumbo to me. And I totally understand what you’re saying about always trying to get to the most current set of standards, whatever we’re talking about.
If I’m a small business owner, and I need a new website, and I’ve heard about this legislation stuff, how do I ask the questions in a way that are easy for me to understand because I’m not the technical expert. I’m relying on the person building the site for me or providing the software for me or whatever.
How do I speak in non legislative lingo to find a vendor that’s going to be able to provide me with what I need?
Jennifer: One thing I am going to say is that with the AODA and under the Customer Service Standard, there is a training responsibility by small business owners. And so all small business owners should provide their employees and themselves with training on accessibility language so that they have the background and knowledge in order to ask these questions.
And the questions they should be asking the vendor is if they are legislatively compliant. So are you going to make my website so that it is accessible here in Canada or globally. And I would put that in the contract. I would ensure that through the procurement process that there is a statement in the contract that holds the vendor responsible for making the environment accessible.
And it doesn’t have to be following a lot of, of language around accessibility, but using the term accessibility and legislation would then ensure that the contract at least is binding and that the vendor is then responsible for educating themselves on what does that mean. Now, I would also encourage that the vendor, through their customer service training, or maybe seeking out the skill set from an accessibility professional, that they do find out how to check if their website is accessible.
Because just relying on a vendor to say it is, may not be good enough. So whether that’s asking a professional to check their website for them, or maybe asking their disability community and their user group for their feedback and input.
Sandi: So when David started the podcast, he talked about how legislation was introduced to bring in seatbelts to improve health outcomes for people that get into vehicles.
And he talked about smoking legislation to try and get that under control. In your experience, have you seen any kind of shift around accessibility in the same way that we see, you know, most people wear a seatbelt now? Do you see it shifting at all in the field of accessibility?
Jennifer: I think that as we begin to educate people, and our younger audience takes more recognition of the accessibility laws and what their individual rights are they are starting to notice it.
An accessible website is a much nicer website. It’s clearer, it’s easier to understand, it’s easier to follow. It just has better usability. And therefore, it’s increasing traffic, it’s increasing, you know, consumer spending, and it helps to meet their legislative requirements, of course.
What I do see in Europe, specifically in the UK, under their legislation, the Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations, is there that now requiring organizations to have an accessibility statement. And It’s something that the W3C is also recommending. And that accessibility statement indicates what legislation the website is trying to meet, how it works with users assistive technologies, and where there are still barriers to access, but also what they’re planning to do about it.
So it’s holding them accountable. And I think these accessibility statements are starting to become more expected and therefore holding the organizations accountable, so making it more mainstream.
Sandi: So then who would be writing the statement? Is it the owner of the site that needs to put that together or do they ask the vendor who built the site to do it for them? What’s usually the best, best approach for something like that?
Jennifer: So I think a collaborative approach is probably the best approach. The vendor knows where the barriers are, what they were able to do, or what they weren’t able to do, and when the timeline is that they’ll have it done, where the organization is the one making the commitment.
In Ontario with our, under the AODA, businesses that employ more than 50 individuals have to have a multi year plan. And as part of that multi year plan, they have to write a commitment to accessibility. So it’s very much in line with that as well.
David: One of the big challenges I see with small business owners is, you know, they really struggle with resources and available cash on hand.
And they’re very dependent on third party providers. So, say I’m a small business owner and I hire a website developer. Say they produce websites in using WordPress. So I say I need an accessible website. I go to the WordPress developer and they generate this website for me. It looks good to me, but then I find out that there’s plugins on there, like calendars and what have you that are not accessible to screen reader, users and other devices.
Where’s the responsibility lie? I would like to think that small business owners should learn more about advocating for their clients, but they seem to depend a lot on the WordPress developer to provide them with the accessible websites. Where do you think the responsibility lies and how can they ensure that their developers doing the right thing?
Jennifer: I think that there has definitely been a shift in the mindset of those that are procuring services and products. With the European Accessibility Act, their big shift is ensuring that the vendor is now responsible. Where a lot of the other accessibility acts, like the AODA and the Accessible Canada Act, it puts the responsibility on the business owner or the public institution, municipality, government, educational institution.
It puts the responsibilities on them to ensure the accessibility of their environments and their content where the European Accessibility Act is shifting that focus to be the responsibility of the product owner or service provider. And so I think through the procurement process, if organizations, when they’re purchasing, you know, whether that be a new website or a software, they need to ensure that they’re putting that responsibility back on the vendor who’s creating that environment to begin with.
And that’s probably the one of the biggest shifts we’ve seen and where we can through that, you know, our contracts and ensuring the wording in our contracts hold someone responsible that we’re going to sort of force our vendors and product creators to increase their knowledge of accessibility so that when it’s created, it’s created right from the very beginning.
Now, that does not take the responsibility away from the small business owner, because oftentimes, you know, a website creator will create a website, say in WordPress, but then they hand the responsibility back to the business owner to upload content and to manage their website. And so then that responsibility shifts to them to make sure that they’re creating accessible content as well.
And so it’s really about educating and educating themselves to ensure they’re doing it properly.
David: The fourth AODA review that was published last year, 2023, stated that disability is in crisis in Ontario. And it points to the fact that there’s very little enforcement of the standards. What do you think we should be doing in Ontario to educate our small business owners and maybe trying to move away from the the hammer and maybe offer more carrots?
Jennifer: Yeah, I think Rich Donovan’s review was very telling about the lack of movement that has been seen in our legislative bodies around accessibility in Ontario, where other provinces are making more headway now towards it. I think the way that we can provide that carrot is by presenting the business plan, that there is a lot of benefits to creating accessible environments.
Not only are we minimizing our legal risk, but it’s extending our market research. We know that at least one in five individuals identify as having a disability. And you wouldn’t want to move 20 percent of your potential clients away from your business by excluding them. And so understanding that you really are going to increase your market reach if you’re able to make environments that are barrier free.
It not only increases your market reach, but it enhances your brand. And it also helps to really drive innovation that, you know, when we look at large corporations that have really embraced accessibility, like Apple, for example, it really establishes a community of individuals that are very, very committed to the brand.
So, for individuals that use the accessibility features in their iPhones, they are very dedicated to that brand and will stick with that brand because it, it, you know, that Apple has made it a priority. And so, if we can look at the positives, and not just this legal requirement, but how this can really benefit an organization I think that’s really the carrot in this situation.
David: Can you recommend any programs or education providers that can help small business? to develop the awareness, but help develop the how to skills?
Jennifer: So, AccessibilityConsulting.ca, we are educators that provide education on digital accessibility. One thing I can say is right now, I’m working on a research project of modernizing digital education in Ontario, where really, through an environmental scan and a literature review demonstrated that there is very much a need for educated individuals to support these government initiatives to create digital accessible environments and content.
However, there’s a lack of educational resources in our public education system. And so for individuals to acquire this education, they’re currently having to go to private organizations who do a specialty in the digital environment. So in addition to ourselves, there’s definitely other organizations out there that can support that, that are fantastic.
But they really, it is an individual education piece right now. Through our research, our employer group really highlighted that this is a hidden expense that all these different organizations are currently producing their own training of their staff, creating resources and training opportunities, which is fantastic.
But every organization is having to do this because there isn’t a central resource right now.
Sandi: And that is so incredibly frustrating. The numbers say that, that the older we get, the more likely we’re going to develop a disability of some sort. Our bodies are just going to start falling apart on us, and we’re not going to be able to see as well, or hear as well, or move as well.
If we don’t have people who know how to deliver, whether it’s in the digital space, or the built space, or whatever space you want to talk about, are we headed for trouble as the boomers age if we don’t have these kinds of supports ready to go and the people that know how to do that ready to go?
Jennifer: Yeah, I absolutely think so.
You know, I was speaking to my mom and she was having to go through some trouble with her phone company and getting her connectivity sorted out. And she was very frustrated, and she was commenting that, you know, as somebody who’s nearing 80, should she be having to do all of this? And she was really struggling with it, although doesn’t have any, what she would declare as a disability, she does have arthritis.
Her vision is deteriorating. Her hearing is going and she’s having some physical challenges. So she is acquiring disabilities as she ages, but she’s very digitally savvy and wants to have these environments connected so that she can access her tablet, her phone, her smart devices in the household, and as we age, our group of seniors are going to become more and more digitally savvy.
And so the need for accessible environments that are digital but also physical in our home, our appliances are becoming more digital. We’re having, you know, smart washers and dryers and smart refrigerators, smart thermostats. All of that has to be considered for this growing population that has high spending power.
And if things are not accessible for them in this upcoming, very digitally savvy group, then the product owners are going to find that to be, um, quite a barrier for them in selling these products.
Sandi: Jennifer, I know you work in the UK, and you’ve been doing that work for a couple of years now, and you’ve done work in Canada, obviously.
Do you see a difference in how organizations approach this in the UK versus Canada? Or is it pretty much a similar approach?
Jennifer: I would say overall, it’s very similar of a mindset. For the most part, organizations seem to be just learning about digital accessibility and their requirement to meet the legislation.
Larger organizations seem to be somewhat more mature in their adoption of the legislative requirements, where smaller organizations and those that are providing to more the public versus the government seem to be floundering a little bit.
To go back with what David said at the beginning about, you know, seatbelts or the smoking those were very public campaigns. I mean, there was a lot of attention given to both of those initiatives, but there isn’t a lot of public campaigning for digital accessibility or accessibility in general.
And so only until it comes to you having to submit a compliance report or the government reaching out because they’ve conducted an audit are you then aware of it. And so it always seems to be an afterthought and not something that’s built into it.
Sandi: So then the organizations that are actually doing it, how are they finding out? Is it coming through their lawyers? What is motivating these organizations then that are actually doing this work?
Jennifer: Well, I can say that the procurement process is where I’ve made the most impact, I think, is that when we’re procuring for a large academic institution, organizations want to make that sale, and so they want to meet that requirement.
Now, as a single institution, we have a lot of buying power, but as a group of institutions, we have a lot more buying power. And so, that seems to have made quite an impact. Academic institutions are coming together to put forth procurement procedures and policies, wording for contracts to make that a unanimous front in pushing that forward.
In the United States, under the ADA Title II, academic institutions will have to ensure the digital environment is fully accessible for all students, and that will really push vendors to ensure their products are compliant.
David: Well, thank you very much, Jennifer, for joining us, and I appreciate your, your wisdom in helping our listeners to understand really what legislation is really all about and how to become more involved with the accessibility education. How can people reach you if they want to reach out for more information?
Jennifer: I can be reached at AccessibilityConsulting.ca that’s our website, or you can email me at jennifer at AccessibilityConsulting.ca. I’m also available on LinkedIn at Jennifer Curry Jahnke, and that’s J A H N K E.
Sandi: So to finish off the episode, is there one practical tip you can offer our listeners that would help them get a handle on digital accessibility, and, or perhaps the legislation that impacts digital accessibility?
Jennifer: I would say that with the statistics that say one in five Canadians have a disability, that it is highly likely that somebody in their organization is disabled and reaching out to our user group and getting their feedback and input on our digital environments or on our built environments, our physical environments, our employment practices are really a great start at moving this agenda forward, having invested users is the best way to have a united front that can really motivate individuals to support these initiatives and to remove barriers to access.
Sandi: Well, thank you very much, Jennifer. I really appreciate you taking the time to speak with David and I today. I appreciate your insights and your knowledge around the legislative spectrum around the world.
It’s very insightful and I’m sure very helpful for our listeners. So thank you very much.
Jennifer: Well, thank you for inviting me. Honestly, to have the opportunity to speak with both of you, who I highly regard as mentors in this digital accessibility space has been a real privilege. So thank you.
David: The views, thoughts, and opinions.
Expressed on this podcast are the speaker’s own and do not necessarily represent those of the podcast team and partners. This podcast is for information and learning purposes only. The Practical Accessibility Insights podcast is hosted by CMS Web Solutions. The intent of this podcast is to raise awareness for practical advice and strategies for making digital and physical environments more accessible to everyone.
Thank you for joining us in this time of discovery and sharing for a more. Inclusive society. If you have questions or comments, you can email us at info I N F O @david.best or Sandi, S A N D I @CMSWebSolutions.com. For more information and resources, go to www dot CMS Web Solutions dot com or www.BestAccessibility.consulting.

Guest Speaker
Jennifer Curry Jahnke
Jennifer is an award-winning professor and academic researcher and consultant with academic institutions and organizations across the globe. As a digital accessibility expert, Jennifer is an active member of legislative committees, an international speaker, and is a certified member of the International Association of Accessibility Professionals (IAAP). Jennifer is currently the Manager of Digital Accessibility at the University of Birmingham, and the Principal Educator with AccessibilityConsulting.ca.