did a survey of the accessibility of Canadian political websites related to the ongoing election here and released their findings a few days ago: Canadian election Web sites flunk standards test. Note (as readers here will likely know already) that it is Joe Clark the accessibility expert and gadfly, not Joe Clark the former Prime Minister, who did this work, as they humourously note several times.
As always, it’s tempting to give them a pass on this, but it’s well past time that we cease to do so. It’s 2004 and the use of the web for political and basic informational needs is hardly new – it is incumbent on people who are trying to communicate to give some thought to the quality of their work. A politician would never release a TV ad that was full of video artifacts or anything – they demand a basic level of quality from the craftspeople who produce such material. Likewise, the state of the art in Canadian politics should be a great deal better than it is right now.
