Accessibility statement

This statement applies to content published on the www.environment.gov.scot domain and subdomains.

We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts using browser or device settings
  • zoom in up to 400% without the text spilling off the screen
  • navigate most of the website using a keyboard or speech recognition software
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)

We’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.

AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

How accessible this website is

We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:

  • our maps and data visualisation tools may not be fully accessible to screen reader software
  • most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
  • videos do not have captions

Feedback and contact information

If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, or if you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille please contact us

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS)

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

SEPA is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

Compliance status

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

Non-accessible content

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons:

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Some of our documents are not accessible and do not have an accessible alternative. These documents may fail issues under WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4 (distinguishable), 2.1 (keyboard accessible), 2.4 (navigable) and 3.1 (readable).

Some data table rows and columns, and list elements are not marked up semantically, and this information may not be presented to assistive technologies. This does not meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 (info and relationships).

Some elements do not have sufficient colour contrast. This does not meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4.3 (contrast (minimum)).

The dropdown menus cannot be accessed by using a keyboard. This does not meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.1.1 (keyboard).

Some PDF documents do not include titles describing their topic or purpose. This does not meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.2 (page titled).

Certain links use general link text like ‘Click here’ with no surrounding context as to the purpose or destination of the link. Certain links lack an accessible name. Screen readers won’t read what the link does so will read out the whole URL instead. This does not meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.4 (link purpose).

The default display of the focus indicator is not always visible. This doesn’t meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.7 (focus visible).

Some elements do not have unique IDs, preventing assistive technologies from being able to interact with them. This does not meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 4.1.1 (parsing).

Navigational elements are using incorrect ARIA references. This does not meet WCAG 2.2 success criterion 4.1.2 (name, role, value).

Content that is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

PDFs and other documents

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.

Maps and data

Many of the map and data applications within Scotland’s environment website are not accessible and fall outside the scope of the accessibility regulations.

What Scotland’s environment are doing to improve accessibility

Review and fix links with issues including alt text, empty links, broken links highlighted by the audit.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 8th September 2020. It was last reviewed on 14th March 2023.

Sample pages from Scotland’s environment website were selected for testing – these pages were considered to be representative of the website and it’s content and functionality.


This page was reviewed on 14 Mar 2023

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