Sight, hearing, language, literacy and other accessibility factors affect quite large numbers of people. In making every possible effort to reach all people, census needs to create effective choices that make it easier for everyone to take part, while respecting everyone's rights to confidentiality and equal opportunity.
The 2011 Census will include a rich mix of tools and guidance designed to make it as easy as possible for everyone to complete their questionnaire. The online questionnaire and online help service will overcome many barriers to completion, by removing the need to write down answers, automatically skipping questions that do not apply and providing intuitive guidance for each question. Another benefit is being able to save your answers so far and come back to complete the questionnaire later.
For both the online and hand-completed questionnaire, one of the greatest challenges has been to define, develop and deliver specific help for people with sight, hearing, literacy, language and other problems and based on feedback from previous census, ONS are making an extra effort with accessibility groups and stakeholders to make sure the 2011 Census caters for everyones needs.
2011 Census accessible formats, compliant with government legislation and guidelines are:
- Braille guidance booklet (English and Welsh)
- Audio guides: online, CD, cassette tape
- BSL video and DVD guide
- Text Relay
- Easy-to-read information booklet
- Large print booklet (for completion)
- Translation guidance booklets, including a sample questionnaire in more than 50 languages
- BrowseAloud (to enable web pages to be read aloud)
- Options to increase type size and change colour combinations on web pages.
For more information, visit www.census.gov.uk or the 'Contact Census' page in the related links on the right.
Page last updated: 21st February 2011
