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NHS Education for Scotland

A skilled and sustainable workforce for a healthier Scotland

Accessibility statement

Accessibility statement for NHS Education for Scotland Corporate website

This accessibility statement applies to the website https://www.nes.scot.nhs.uk/.

This website is run by NHS Education for Scotland. 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
  • zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
  • navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
  • navigate most of the website using 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

Parts of this website are not fully accessible. For example:

  • some of our older PDFs are not screen reader compatible due to lack of Alt tags on images and missing document titles
  • the captcha that we use on our contact forms isn't accessible for screen reader users

Feedback and contact information

If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, please contact us on the following email address support.web@nes.scot.nhs.uk and tell us:

  • the web address (URL) of the content
  • your name and email address
  • the format you would like the information provided in

If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:

We will reply within five working days to let you know when we will be able to provide the information. We will consider each request but may not be able to provide an alternative accessible format on every occasion.

Any personal data provided as part of the request will be stored in line with our privacy notice.

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

NHS Education for Scotland 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

The website has been tested against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standard.

This website is partially compliant with the WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) version 2.2 AA standard, due to the following non-compliances (and/or) the following exemptions. 

Non accessible content

The content is non-accessible for the following reason(s):

Some of our PDFs may not have appropriate titles and are missing ALT tags for images. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.1.1 (Non-text Content) and 2.4.2 Page Titled (Level A).

Next steps

  • we are currently looking at our existing PDFs to see how accessible they are across the website and whether they are still needed.
  • we are also looking at further training for content creators to ensure all PDFs are as accessible as they can be.

We are currently using a Captcha that is currently not accessible to screen reader users. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 Info and Relationships (Level A), 2.4.6 Headings and Labels (Level AA), 3.3.2 Labels or Instructions (Level A) and 3.3.7 Accessible Authentication (Minimum) (AA).

Next steps

  • We are currently assessing alternatives to the existing captcha which we will be looking to implement by the middle of 2025.

Content that’s 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. 

Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.

Live video

We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.

What we are doing to improve accessibility

We have recently completed a new round of testing and discovered accessibility issues which were fixed in April 2025.

This website is now partially WCAG 2.2 compliant.

Our plans for the 2025 to 2026 financial year are to look at fixing the captcha issue and making some of our PDFs more accessible on the website.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 1st November 2024. It was last reviewed on 20th April 2025.

This website was last tested on 20th April 2025 against the WCAG 2.2 AA standard.

The test was carried out by a member of our website team. The most viewed pages were tested using automated testing tools by our website team.