Background

6 Poor accessibility of government websites is a problem for many countries. The trend is for government to improve accessibility through specifying standards for public website design.

7 New Zealand began to address this problem in 2000, when the Government Information Systems Managers Forum (GOVIS) started adapting the UK Government's Web Guidelines to suit the New Zealand environment. The UK Guidelines were chosen because they are based on proven international best practice standards developed through the 'Web Accessibility Initiative' (WAI) of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). [An international body recognised as the prime authoritative source of World Wide Web standards.]

8 In November 2000, GOVIS passed draft New Zealand Guidelines to the State Services Commission (SSC) to refine and release for consultation with local and central government, voluntary organisations, interested individuals, and the web design industry.

9 The SSC finalised and published the Guidelines [NZ Government Web Guidelines: Version 1.3;State Services Commission, August 2001.] in August 2001. It released a draft version 2 for wide consultation in October 2002. An advisory panel of officials and web industry representatives considered submissions, and the final document was released to agencies in January 2003 [NZ Government Web Guidelines: Version 2.1;State Services Commission, January 2003.] .