The Resource Kit: ‘Disability Discrimination Act: Guidelines on Equal Access to Digital Goods and Services’

Rosemary Kayess: I am Rosemary Kayess, the Disability Discrimination Commissioner, with the Australian Human Rights Commission. And I’d like to start by acknowledging the Traditional Owners on the lands on which we are all meeting today, and pay my respects to Elders past, present and emerging. I am speaking to you from Bidjigal land of – the land of the Bidjigal people of the Eora Nation.

I now have another technical difficulty with PowerPoint please.

Sarah Pulis: No worries, Rosemary. I might just jump in very briefly. I was very sorry to interrupt you. I just want to do a few housekeeping matters before we pass over to you, Rosemary.

So I would also like to acknowledge the Traditional Custodians on the land on which we are meeting today. And we do pay our respects to Elders past, present, and emerging and also extend those respects to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples joining us today.

If you do know the Country that you are on today, I encourage you to take a moment to reflect on its history, and the deep cultural connection that First Nations peoples have with the land.

Since we are sadly a little late, we are obviously celebrating the launch of the Disability Discrimination Act Guidelines on Equal Access to Digital Goods and Services. This will be…

Rosemary: Deb… sorry.

Sarah: That’s OK. This is a landmark today for digital accessibility. As we see some updated guidance around making things inclusive and accessible for people with disability within the digital space. I will hand over to Rosemary in just a sec, but we also have as the Disability Discrimination Commissioner for the Australian Human Rights Commission, we also though have Neil Jarvis on the line today who is the Strategy and Policy Lead for Intopia.

A few housekeeping matters. Time permitting, and we might need to see how we go towards the end, we will have some time for Q&A. You will be able to send through any questions you have, either through the Q&A feature, or also by raising your hand during the Q&A time at which time I will be able to activate your audio so that you can ask your question verbally.

We do have our captioners here today from Ai – Media. And also our sign language interpreters Kate and Fiona from Deaf Connect. We are using Zoom’s sign language interpretation feature which means that the sign language interpreters should be available to you in a separate window. The webinar – a recording of today’s webinar will also be available after the event.

And without further ado, I will pass over to Rosemary to continue talking about the Guidelines.

Rosemary: Thank you very much, Sarah. And I do apologise, everybody. This is what you get for coming in late. You don’t know what’s going on.

Sarah, are you OK to move my slides forward for me, please? And, as I noted earlier, I am speaking to you from the lands of the Bidjigal people of the Eora Nation. And I pay my respects to all Aboriginal people joining us today.

So, you may have noticed that the Prime Minister has called an election for the 3rd May, which means we are currently in what they call ‘Caretaker mode’. Unfortunately, this does not mean a 5 week holiday for me or the Commission, but it does mean that to maintain our independence, we cannot be seen to be contributing to the election debate.

So what that means is I won’t be able to comment on the policies of either the Government or the Opposition, or any of the other political parties contesting the election, and there may be limits on what I can say in response to questions.

So, what we’re here to talk about Guidelines for the digital age. And we’re all part of the digital age, a time of rapid technological advancement and change. This has the ability and potential to break the social isolation and exclusion faced by people with disability. However, without accessibility and universal design, it can have the inverse effect of entrenching inequality and discrimination.

Technology has become an essential element of how we live, work and, interact. Technology is central to our communication, our economy, education, healthcare, and social dynamics, and as such facilitates our enjoyment of fundamental human rights.

However, we don’t all enjoy access to technology on an equal basis with others.

The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the CRPD, reaffirms people with disability as subjects of human rights, and embeds impairment as part of human diversity.

The Preamble to the Convention makes it clear that everyone is entitled to all of the human rights and fundamental freedoms contained in the International Bill of Human Rights, which is the combination of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

The CRPD recognises impairment should not be the basis for limiting or denying human rights. The purpose of the CRPD is to promote, protect and ensure the full and equal enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms by all people with disability. People with disability have a right to the benefits of technology on an equal basis with others.

The fulfilment of this right requires that technology be accessible, affordable, and adhere to the principles of universal design to facilitate the realisation of all other CRPD rights, such as the right to live independently and be included in the community, the right to freedom of expression and opinion and access to information, and the right to employment, education and health, and equality before the law.

The legal standard of non – discrimination is an inherent element in all rights in the CRPD, and it prohibits discrimination on the basis of impairment.

The standard of non – discrimination applies to all technology, not only assistive technology, or technology to enhance the lives of people with disability. It is a requirement for all technology to be inclusive and responsive to the needs of people with disability, so that everyone can enjoy the benefits of technology.

What this means in the Australian context is that the Disability Discrimination Act prohibits and seeks to eliminate discrimination on the basis of disability in all areas of public life. This covers areas of public life that have a digital component, for example, online learning, hybrid working conditions, and accessing essential services such as government services including emergency information, banking, and online shopping.

I have had the pleasure of working with Intopia in the first year of my term as Commissioner, on updating the Commission’s Guidelines on digital accessibility. In line with contemporary digital environments and practices, the updated Guidelines encompass digital accessibility across a wide range of platforms beyond websites and web-based content.

The Commission has prepared the Guidelines in the exercise of its function under section 67(1)K of the Disability Discrimination Act. They are an update of the Commission’s World Wide Web Access: Disability Discrimination Act Advisory Note version 4.1, which were released in 2014. They build upon the previous versions of the Commission’s Advisory Note to reflect changes in technology, its role within society, as well as national and international standards, and policies that define how technology provides equal access for people with disability.

Their function is to provide guidance to duty holders in understanding their obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act.

They are not time – bound and relate to current liabilities of duty holders to eliminate discrimination on the grounds of disability in the delivery of digital goods and services.

The Guidelines themselves are not legally binding, and should be read in conjunction with the whole of the Disability Discrimination Act, as well as states and territory anti – discrimination laws. Their advantage is that, unlike legislation, they can be responsive to rapidly changing technology.

The key audience for the Guidelines is people in organisations who have obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act not to discriminate against people because of disability when providing digital goods and services, such as creators of digital goods and services, designers, developers, publishers and educators. Compliance professionals, generalists and specialists such as those working in Data Privacy, Corporate Affairs, Information Security, and Human Resources. Organisation leaders such as Boards and Directors, principals and managers, and procurement professionals.

These Guidelines are also critical for people with disability and their representative organisations, disability peak bodies, and advocates. These Guidelines will assist them with understanding and exercising their right to non – discrimination in the digital world.

I would like to thank the early project panel contributing authors, the expert advisory group members, and the individuals and organisations that participated by making submissions to the public consultation. I would also like to pass on my sincere thanks to Intopia. They have been a joy to work with through this process. Thank you very much.

Sarah: Thank you very much, Rosemary. And also for those kind words. It’s now my pleasure to introduce Neil Jarvis. Neil Jarvis is the Strategy and Policy Lead of Intopia, and along with Andrew Arch has been instrumental in working with the Commission on the new Guidelines.

Neil, over to you.

Neil Jarvis: Many thanks. And thank you to Rosemary for her words and her kind words, and it has also been a pleasure to work alongside you and your team, Rosemary, over the last year or so.

So as Rosemary has outlined, the Commission was keen, and needed to update the Advisory Note that was published in 2014. It was version 4.1 of the World Wide Web Advisory Note. And it needed to do this for a number of reasons. One, 11 years is a long time in the world of technology. But also it needed to expand the coverage of the note so that it was covering more than just the World Wide Web, I think it was called back then. As we all know now, so much that goes on in the digital landscape does so in a variety of ways, and not just on websites. It was also wanting to recognise the importance of recommendations that were made in its Human Rights and Technology report that was published in 2021. And it was important that the Advisory Note would be able to assist people who wanted to try and implement those recommendations.

So, the Commission underwent an open RFP process, which was one that enabled us at Intopia to show an interest, and also then to work with the Commission to appreciate that our values and their values were aligned. And we were asked to help in the process of updating the Note, which then became Guidelines.

And I can speak as one of those involved in this process from start to finish, it has been a pleasure and we are so honoured to have been asked to do the work.

So before I go into the process of the Guidelines update and also what is in them, it might be helpful for those of you who don’t know who Intopia is, just to say a few very brief words about us. We are a social enterprise. Our aim is to create an inclusive digital world. We have the largest team of digital accessibility experts that are working in the southern hemisphere.

As a social enterprise, Intopia’s purpose is to give back to the community – that’s what we are very much all about. We are a certified B Corp and Pledge 1% member organisation, and that means that we give back, in our case, 20% of our profits to social impact causes and initiatives. Mostly in the disability community. Since we started in 2016, we’ve donated $700,000 to that effect. So, working with the Commission on this update to the Guidelines, was very much in our wheelhouse – it was something that struck a chord with us.

So the process for updating – and it’s been a process that has taken us just over a year, but one which has been thorough and has involved as many people as possible.

We supported the Commission to produce the Guidelines in a number of ways. We helped to create the advisory groups, which Rosemary mentioned, and supported the works of those groups throughout the project. There were 2 of them in the end, a technical group which drew from experts in the digital accessibility and ICT sector, a user group, the 2nd group, which drew from disability organisations, and potential disabled people and users themselves, as well as people who were going to be using the Guidelines to provide accessible goods and services.

Both groups met periodically throughout the project to give us feedback on updates that were happening, as well as to help us with wording, and with structure, and all those sorts of things.

The group members also were very active between meetings supporting us on specific questions and specific activities. So it wasn’t just a question of turning up to a few meetings.

In terms of the materials that we used in the update process, well, one of the key requirements was to expand the advice that had been given in the 2014 Note, as was said before. So we needed to cover all aspects of technology, and that would include things like mobile devices, point of sale kiosks and payment machines, and any good or service, really, that was provided in a digital manner. And nowadays that’s most of them, one way or another.

They also needed to reflect the updates and even introduction of new technical standards, guidelines and policies that help people to live up to those requirements.

We took what we could from the 2014 edition and applied it, because you don’t want to reinvent the wheel where you don’t need to. We also incorporated new ideas that were put forward by a team led by our friend and colleague Greg Alchin in 2022. They were the first draft in many ways of what became these Guidelines. And we looked at current trends and what might be happening in the near future, with respect to accessibility and technology. We drew on the recommendations in the Human Rights and Technology report published by the Commission in 2021, in particular recommendations 3 and 16 on the use of AI, particularly by government in the process of decision – making. Also recommendation 19 on the regulation of biometric technologies. Also recommendations 25 and 26 on compliance with – by government and industry with digital accessibility guidelines and standards.

And finally, recommendation 32 on accessible information about goods and services themselves. All of those recommendations, if they were to be implemented by the people they were aimed at, would require updated information about how to do that, and advise on how to do that.

So, having pulled together our materials and our people, we spent the next few months drafting and redrafting what would become these Guidelines. We tested our content with the Commission and with the advisory groups. As well as that, the Commission went out to the public for a consultation process, which lasted for a month.

As a result of that and all the other that comments we’d received, further drafts were put together, incorporating feedback and comments from all of that process. All of our drafts were reviewed by internal teams within the Human Rights Commission, so that they adhered to the legal requirements that the Guidelines would have, and that they were written with the Commission’s voice.

So, what do the Guidelines actually cover? The Guidelines are divided into 3 chapters. The 1st gives an overview of who and what digital products and services are covered by the Disability Discrimination Act, and how the Act fits into the regulatory context of disability in Australia. There is advice on good practice and keeping up with the law. Topics covered include an overview of the law, what it covers and who it applies to, what is meant by digital goods and services, advice on meeting the requirements of the law, and delivering equal access.

Good practice, including universal design, and also some comments on the fast-changing technology and the implications of those changes of people with disability.

The 2nd chapter goes into more detail about those techniques for achieving equal access when providing goods and services in a digital form. Topics in this chapter include a discussion about the business benefits, implementing a strategic approach to providing equal access, the importance of seeking expert advice from people with disability themselves, incorporating digital accessibility into the product development cycle – right from the start, not as an afterthought, and incorporating digital accessibility into the procurement process when organisations are going out for new equipment, new software, etc.

Digital accessibility and risk management was also covered in this chapter.

The 3rd chapter provides a handy reference for the various standards and guidelines which underpin this edition of the Guidelines. Topics here included the web content accessibility guidelines, authoring and plain language guidelines, standards covering product and service design, including hardware, software and content management, Australian Government standards and policies both at Commonwealth and State level, and industry standards produced by the private sector, business groups, to assist their member organisations to provide services accessibly.

There are also references which provide further reading and suggestions that people can go and learn more from.

So, how will the Guidelines benefit you? And how can they help meet legal obligations?

The Guidelines enable you to convert knowing you need to meet the requirements of the Disability Discrimination Act into knowing how to go about it. They will help you to understand the real world meanings by which you can meet your legal obligations.

They explain and give links to more detailed information about the techniques and practices, standards, and other guidelines. So they don’t just tell you what they are, they explain them and then link further to – so that you can go and read more about them at your leisure.

At Intopia we talk with organisations every day about – who are keen to raise their game when it comes to digital accessibility. In strategy and policy terms we talk about raising digital accessibility maturity. We are often told that we know we need to do it. We know we need to do it for business reasons, for social responsibility reasons as well. But we just don’t know where to start, and then, when we have started, how to sustain our effort. These Guidelines will help to get from knowing what to knowing how. Intopia is honoured to have been part of this journey. Thank you very much.

Sarah: Thank you very much for that, Neil. We are now moving into our Q&A time. Just as a reminder, you can use the Q&A feature within Zoom, which should be located on your Zoom toolbar, to submit a question. And thank you to everyone who has submitted already a question. We will certainly get through as many as we can, and also respond to those that we can’t.

In addition to the written Q&A feature, if you would prefer to verbalise, to speak your question, please feel free to raise your hand using the Zoom features, and I will be able to see that on screen. I will then actually be able to give you access to your microphone so that you can ask your question verbally.

I now have the inenviable task of choosing from these great questions. And thank you to everyone who has submitted these. I might start – in no particular order, I might actually start with Emma Bennison’s question. So Emma has asked, “I recall that the Human Rights and Technology report published in 2021 included a section on audio description and captioning. Do the Guidelines cover access to TV and live events?”.

And I will open that up to either you Rosemary, or Neil, to answer that.

Neil: Yeah, I’m happy to take that. They cover the technical and digital aspects of that. So, the – as I remember, and I confess, I haven’t read the report for a while now, not since we started working on this, but my recollection is that some of those recommendations were to do with the number of hours of audio description by broadcasters, and that sort of thing.

The Guidelines don’t address that, but they do address the fact that it is required. And also that whenever a – any kind of digital content is being communicated, it needs to be done in an accessible way. And it doesn’t matter whether that means by providing an accessible website or an accessible app. It also would be, in some instances, an accessible broadcast, or performance, I guess.

Sarah: Thank you very much, Neil.

The next question is from Amanda Ralph. “Several countries and regions around the world, particularly Europe, are introducing updated legislation that requires organisations and industry compliance with digital accessibility. Regarding the Disability Discrimination Act as guidance, while it provides a framework for inclusive digital products, do you think as guidance not enforcement, it will be effective in driving the delivery and adoption of inclusive and accessible digital products and services?”. I may pass that one to you, Rosemary.

Rosemary: Regulatory frameworks are always an unknown, legislation can be stronger, but it is also the regulatory powers that you put into legislation that makes it more effective.

In many ways, the timing of these Guidelines is interesting because apart from the election that’s just been called, the Government has indicated that they will be moving on the Disability Discrimination Act reform that was proposed and recommended by the Disability Royal Commission. So it will be interesting to see when that reform process starts, what regulatory frameworks are in place within the DDA, which may give mechanisms such as the Guidelines greater power, well it has the potential to give the Guidelines greater enforceability.

So, it is nearly a ‘wait and see’ kind of situation about what might happen with DDA reform. And as I said, it depends on how the regulatory framework for legislation is constructed to ensure that there is strong enforceability – so you can have regulation that is not as effective as other forms of regulation. So we just need to see how it plays out. And it’s also about – they generally talk about clarity being the greatest driver for duty holders. So if the Guidelines give the clarity that a duty holder requires, then you tend to see compliance.

Sarah: Thank you very much. We have a raised hand from Kathryn. Kathryn, you should now be able to use your audio button to unmute and to share your question.

We might come back to Kathryn in a sec. We have a question from a Matt Hawkins. And I will note, for anyone who posted the question of when are the Guidelines out, where can we get access, we will definitely have that information at the end of the webinar, and also the Commission, and also Intopia will be sharing that via our social media channels after this event.

But Matt’s question is, “are there any thoughts about an education campaign in regards to getting the Guidelines out there into the broader community which includes suppliers, procurement, technology departments, and also how can we help to do that?

Rosemary: Dissemination of these assistive mechanisms for ensuring compliance with the DDA is something that we, as the Commission, will automatically take on board to try and disseminate the Guidelines as broadly as possible – as I was saying, I mean getting clarity to duty holders is one of the big mechanisms for driving compliance, and they need to know what’s the content of the Guidelines. So getting them out there will definitely be an important task.

And how can people help, is to make sure that those sectors in industries, and people that you know that work in this space have access to the Guidelines, know about the Guidelines, and that’s the same for rights holders, so people with disability and disability organisations, the more they are aware of what standards of accessibility they should be able to access, they can direct people, or service providers of goods and services, to the Guidelines if they aren’t quite meeting standards.

Sarah: Thank you very much, Rosemary. At the end of this presentation, Intopia has also put together a Resource Kit with a number of resources, first of all, linking out to the Commission’s resources, the Guidelines themselves, and also the upcoming media release that will be released after this webinar.

We also have a number of supporting resources as well, that might help individuals actually share the Guidelines with their organisation, and also talking more about these in different forums to increase that awareness as well.

Question from Darren Britten, “where can organisations start their digital accessibility journey, and do you have any advice on how they can balance the pace of innovation in digital services, particularly with the rise of gen AI, with the legal obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act?” I will open that up to either of you, whoever would like to jump in on that one.

Neil: I guess one of the things that we would recommend is that they seek advice from organisations in the field. Obviously we’re one of them, and I am not here to do a sales job.

But obviously to start the journey, you need to talk to someone who can help you. I think in many ways the Guidelines do provide a good start in terms of telling you what you need to know about. And if that doesn’t add up to you, because you just haven’t yet embarked on that journey, then seeking advice from either others in your field who have, and/or talking to organisations like Intopia, then I think that is probably helpful because you can get guidance that will judge where you are at in the digital technology continuum. And because no one can become perfectly accessible overnight, it does take time, and if done well, it needs to be done in a planned and strategic manner.

So taking advice on that is always a good thing. But Darren is also spot on that this is a fast-changing environment. The onset of AI, not just AI but AI is one of the big ones, is absolutely having an impact on people’s knowledge and understanding, and again, that’s why you need to look around and take advice from those who can help.

We do live in a time where that information is readily available. Start with the Guidelines.

Sarah: Thank you very much, Neil. We have a hand up from Greg. Greg, you should be able to unmute yourself now.

Greg Alchin: Thank you Sarah, can you hear me OK?

Sarah: We can.

Greg: Lovely. And look congratulations folks on the great work. I’m really, really excited, I am doing a happy dance here in Orange. Just to build upon that last answer, I was going to say we’ve got 2 wonderful Australian standards. AS17161, which has just been released, called ‘Design for All’. So it looks how we bake inclusive design in. And then of course, 301549, which looks at accessibility requirements.

So building upon the great work that’s in the Guidelines, look at these Australian standards which are in fact exact copies of European standards, so it helps build you. But yes building on what you’ve said, Neil, yeah, getting that maturity model done, getting your assessment done, and helping to get all that other stuff done is great as well. But thank you guys, I am so excited about today.

Sarah: Thanks, Greg. We’re just about out of time, but I will choose one more question from Meg Dalling. “Many organisations have access and inclusion plans which may also be registered with the Commission. Would these be a mechanism for reviewing how organisations meet the Guidelines?”

Rosemary: The question raises an interesting point, and I suppose it is what I was trying to get to when I spoke, was that the Guidelines aren’t themselves, the standard people that have to meet, that is still contained within the DDA.

What the Guidelines do is give you guidance on the parameters of the requirements of the DDA. So in terms of a complaint, everything will be looked at on a case-by-case basis. But essentially, you would need to look at your Disability Action Plan against the Guidelines to make sure that what you’ve got in your Disability Action Plan, in terms of your digital goods or services, contain the elements that the Guidelines indicate are important to ensure accessibility.

Sarah: Fantastic, thank you. So, that brings us to the end of our Q&A time. I note we have a lot of questions still open to be answered. So what we will do is we will review those questions and put together some responses to those.

So, what to do next? We are so excited, and I can feel the excitement from the questions and the interaction on this webinar around these Guidelines, so of course we would encourage you to read the Guidelines. The QR code and also short link that is on the screen, which I will read out in a sec, will go to Intopia’s Resource Kit which will link off to, as I mentioned, both the Guidelines, also other resources that the Commission is publishing such as the media release. And then also some assistance resources, so infographics and the like, that might help you in your discussions.

We would love, of course, for you to also share the Guidelines both with your colleagues, and with your organisations. As well as more broadly, within your communities.

We know that after reading the Guidelines and having a chance to consume them, you may have further questions. So in a few weeks’ time, on Tuesday 6th May, we will actually have another session that is an hour long. Starting at 11 AM, going for an hour, where we are actually going to have Neil, Andrew who also worked on the Guidelines from Intopia, and also Sophia from the Australian Human Rights Commission, who will be there to answer your questions.

So feel free to register and join us for that event. The information will be available on that resource link, and also being shared via our social channels. That’s a great time for you to maybe have a chance to absorb the Guidelines, and also to then bring your questions.

I would like to thank everyone for joining us today, and in particular, to Rosemary and the

Commission, and also Neil, Andrew, and the rest of the Intopia team who together have been working on this, and also then working on today’s launch and future activities.

Thank you all very much for joining us. We hope to connect with you soon. On screen, I do have some ways you can connect with both the Commission and Intopia. You can find us both on LinkedIn. You can also find the Commission at humanrights.gov.au as their website, and you can find Intopia at intopia.digital for our website, and also email us at hello@intopia.digital Thank you all very much for attending.