Q1 2020 INDEX - UK Police Force Websites, what's happening with Accessibility?

25 Feb 2020 | Index | Accessibility | Public sector

Adam Turner
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At Sitemorse we published our 2020 Q1 UK Police Forces INDEX this week. The INDEX has been published quarterly since 2006 and ranks the websites of 49 UK police forces, based on User Experience, Search Engine Optimisation and Governance, Risk and Compliance.

Our Q1 2020 INDEX was compiled following over 22 million tests, checks and measures across nearly 70,000 URLs.

Congratulations to Gloucestershire Constabulary for taking first place and Avon and Somerset Constabulary for being the most improved.

Overall, 5 police forces improved the accessibility of their website, whilst 2 have seen it decline and 41 have made no progress.

No Police Forces passed the WCAG 2.1 Level A and AA tests on all of their web pages. Indeed, there was 1 Police Force that failed the level A and AA tests on every page.

European Union Directive 2016/2102/EU, creating a set of standards for EU public sector bodies, using European standard EN 301 549 V1.1.2 (2015-04) was approved on October 26, 2016. It came into force for in the UK on 23 September 2018. The aim of the regulations is to ensure public sector websites and mobile apps can be used by as many people as possible.

This includes those with:

  • impaired vision
  • motor difficulties
  • cognitive impairments or learning disabilities
  • deafness or impaired hearing

New public sector websites have needed to be compliant since 22 September this year, all other public sector websites need to be compliant by 22 September 2020.

If we focus purely on Accessibility and compare the Q1 2020 INDEX results with those from Q4 2019:

  • 1 police force scored 7 or higher (out of 10)
  • 30 police forces scored 5 or 6
  • 18 police forces scored 4 or less

Top ten websites

  1. Gloucestershire Constabulary
  2. Avon and Somerset Constabulary
  3. Thames Valley Police
  4. Leicestershire Constabulary
  5. Metropolitan Police Service
  6. Warwickshire Police Force
  7. Cleveland Police
  8. West Mercia Constabulary
  9. Essex Police
  10. Cheshire Police

Five Most improved websites

  • Avon and Somerset Constabulary
  • Dorset Police
  • North Wales Police
  • Lancashire Police
  • Derbyshire Constabulary

The full 2020 Q1 UK Police Forces results can be found here: Sitemorse UK Police Forces INDEX