Inclusive Communications Working Document

Introduction and Background

1.1 Electronic Communications Directives

In 1999 the Commission launched a major review of existing EU telecommunications law[1]. In July 2000 the Commission proposed a package of measures for a new regulatory framework for electronic communications networks and services. The package consists of six Directives, namely the Framework[2], Access[3], Authorisation[4], Universal Service[5], e-Privacy[6] and Competition[7] Directives, and a Decision on radio spectrum policy[8]. The new regulatory framework for electronic communications was adopted by the Council and the Parliament in 2002, to be applied as of July 2003.

The new regulatory framework is intended to provide a coherent, reliable and flexible approach to the regulation of electronic communication networks and services in fast moving markets. The directives provide a lighter regulatory approach where markets have become more competitive, yet ensure that a minimum of services are available to all users at an affordable price and that the basic rights of consumers continue to be protected.

1.2 COCOM and INCOM

Under the New Regulatory Framework a committee called the Communications Committee (COCOM) with Member State representatives was established to assist the Commission in exercising its powers under the Framework.

In February 2003, COCOM established a special working group to undertake a programme of work during the European Year of People with Disabilities (EYPD). The group gave itself the title of Inclusive Communications (INCOM). According to the terms of reference of the group the group’s purpose is to:

encourage network operators and terminal equipment manufacturers to co-operate in order to facilitate access by users with disabilities to electronic communications services;
raise and spread awareness of the constraints experienced by people with various disabilities in gaining access to and using electronic communications services;
suggest ways of overcoming these constraints, and share experience and good practice identified at international, national, regional or local level;
propose harmonised actions at national level across Member States to implement the objectives of the Framework Directive and related Directives.

The group should compile a final report at the end of 2003, with recommendations where appropriate.

For the complete terms of reference, see Annex 1.

In the INCOM work, a wide range of actors have participated, including the following:

Member States
Associated States
National Regulatory Authorities
AAATE, Association for the Advancement of Assistive Technology in Europe
ANEC, European Association for the Co-ordination of Consumer Representation in Standardisation
COST 219ter: Accessibility for All to Services and Terminals for Next Generation Networks
DIEL, Telecommunications for the Disabled and Elderly
EBU, European Blind Union
ECTA, European Competitive Telecommunications Association
EdeAN, European Design for All e-Accessibility Network
EDF, European Disability Forum
EFHOH, European Federation of Hard of Hearing
EFTA, European Free Trade Association
EHIMA, European Hearing Instruments Manufacturers Association
EICTA, European Information, Communications and Consumer Electronics Technology Industry Associations
EIDD, European Institute for Design and Disability
ETNO, The European Telecommunications Network Operators' Association
ETP, European Telecommunications Platform
ETSI, European Telecommunications Standards Institute
EUD, European Union of the Deaf
GSM Europe
ICTSB, Information and Communications Technologies Standards Board
ITU, International Telecommunications Union
RNIB, Royal National Institute of the Blind
RNID, Royal National Institute for the Deaf
W3C, World Wide Web Consortium

INCOM has held five meetings during 2003. The group has been chaired and managed by the European Commission, Information Society Directorate-General, Unit F-5 Elderly and persons with disabilities.

Throughout its work, INCOM has focused on the user perspective, identifying the constraints and problems users with disabilities face in accessing and using electronic communications as well as potential problems and opportunities in new and future technologies and applications. Existing solutions and approaches have been discussed, as well as different development work and pilot projects. Information has been collected from known sources and through a widely distributed questionnaire, which resulted in 37 replies. A summary of the replies to the questionnaire is included in Annex 2.

Although the time has been limited to ten months, INCOM has been a unique and valuable platform for discussions between all actors in the field who do not otherwise meet in this way. The work carried out should be seen as a first attempt to identify, analyse and discuss the situation, problems and solutions of users with disabilities and electronic communications in a comprehensive way. It is the hope of INCOM that it can be a starting point for future collaboration for the benefit of all involved.

1.3 e-Europe 2002/2005

The eEurope initiative was launched in June 2000 with the aim of accelerating Europe’s transition towards a knowledge based economy and to realise the potential benefits of higher growth, more jobs and better access for all citizens to the new services of the information age.

While in the eEurope 2002 Action Plan accessibility targets primarily concentrated on specific developments for people with disabilities, the emphasis in the eEurope 2005 Action Plan will be on the integration of the needs of all citizens into mainstream goods, services and information flows. The plan, adopted by the European Council in Seville, includes eInclusion in all of its action lines. Some of the specific eInclusion actions included in the eInclusion roadmap are the continued follow-up of the accessibility of public web sites, development of a public procurement toolkit for accessibility, a European curriculum in design-for-all and eInclusion plans in the main action lines eGovernment, eHealth and eLearning.

1.4 European Year of People with Disabilities

There are over 37 million people with disabilities in the European Union (EU). The year 2003 has been designated by the European Union and the disability movement as the European Year of People with Disabilities (EYPD) to highlight barriers and discrimination faced by this significant segment of the population. This report is one of the outcomes of EYPD.

1.5 Definition of disability and demographics

According to the WHO International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF- May 2001) disability is not entirely an attribute of an individual, but rather a complex social and environmental construct largely imposed by societal attitudes and the limitations of the human-made environment. Consequently, any process of amelioration and inclusion requires social action, and it is the collective responsibility of society at large to make the environmental and attitudinal changes necessary for their full participation in all areas of life.

Disabled people are a widely heterogeneous group but they can be divided into the following categories for the purpose of describing difficulty with access to ICT:

People with:

cognitive, learning and developmental difficulties
deafness, hearing impairment;
blindness, visual impairment or partial sight;
deaf-blindness;
speech and language impairments;
physical disabilities.

Data collected by Eurostat, the Eurobarometer and some Member States permit the following generalisations to be made:

With the ageing process, the incidence of disability increases. With an ageing population in Europe, the number of persons with disabilities will grow.
The current estimate of prevalence of disability is 10-15%.

There is an additional significant part of the population who, without being disabled, could benefit directly from measures to improve accessibility and usability primarily designed for disabled people.

Although there is no reliable survey data, it is clear that disabled people face particular problems with ICT accessibility: Persons with major disabilities and impairments face specific problems with human/ICT interfaces.

Persons with major disabilities and impairments face specific problems with human/ICT interfaces.

Assistive technology which supplements mainstream ICT goods and services is often expensive or unavailable.
The combination of assistive technology and mainstream systems reduces reliability.
Even where ICT systems work effectively, content and information about the systems and services are frequently inaccessible because of poor design.

1.6 Non-discrimination

On 24 January 2003, the Commission adopted a Communication in which it sets out its full support to the on going discussion on the elaboration of a United Nations Convention to promote and protect the rights of people with disabilities. The emphasis on non-discrimination is fully in line with the EU rights-based approach to disability. It is also in line with the Article 13 of the Treaty on the basis of which the Council adopted the directive 2000/78/EC promoting equal treatment in the field of employment and occupation.

The Employment Equality Directive[9], adopted in November 2000, lays down a general framework for combating discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation as regards employment and occupation. The Directive requires employers to make reasonable accommodation to cater for the needs of a person with a disability who is qualified to do the job in question. This includes accessibility to ICT systems and services. The deadline for implementation in the Member States of the rules on disability and age was 2 December 2003.

1.7 Inclusion and Accessibility

All citizens have a right to enjoy the full benefits of new technologies. This includes persons with disabilities. Often, as noted, disabled people are excluded through lack of access to ICT but, conversely, it has been shown that they can benefit in some cases even more than their peers as ICT can: reduce domestic isolation; generate new training and employment opportunities; increase the choice of entertainment, particularly for older people who are the most intensive users of broadcasting. There is a special problem with inaccessible information design, particularly in respect of the Internet, even though global guidelines for basic design have been established by the World Wide Web Consortium. It is important to take into account that also people who are not able to read text on a screen will want to use the information it contains.

1.8 Design for All

The most cost effective and non-discriminatory form of access to ICT is through the Design for All Process (sometimes referred to as Universal Design, Barrier Free Design, Accessible Design etc). This concept involves the needs of the whole market, including elderly people and those with disabilities, being taken fully into account in the initial design of goods and services rather than being retro-engineered at a later date at high cost.

Design for All means designing mainstream products and services so that as many people as possible can use them easily - whatever their age and ability. The concept recognises that ability is a continuum, and the usability of products should extend towards the ends of that continuum.

This does not mean that manufacturers are expected to design every product to be usable by every consumer.

Design for All and its specific implications for elderly people and those with disabilities can be considered in three distinct but related phases:

Firstly, the inclusion of the needs of the population as a whole in initial design
Secondly, the inclusion of customisable, configurable or adjustable features in goods and services (e.g., the ability to alter print size on a web page)
Thirdly, the inclusion of standardised connectivity to assistive devices (e.g. interfaces and protocols that enable the connection and use of hearing aids and screen readers, etc).

Relevant work has been done previously under the European Commission RTD programmes, in particular the IST programme, in Design for All. It is also important to mention organisations such as EIDD and EDeAN which continue to work in this area.

There are some key benefits in participating in the Design for All Process:

Legal: Anti-discrimination legislation has been adopted at the EU level in the employment area and in other areas in some Member States. Applying Design for All principles and methods would help to comply with legal requirements.

Market: As noted in 1.5, the elderly and disabled population accounts for a significant market sector and in spite of the economic data cited there are now many people in this sector with significant buying power. In addition, many design for all features do not only benefit disabled consumers, but are also appreciated by non-disabled consumers as they make products and services easier to use for the general public.

Fiscal: All citizens pay through taxation for public sector information and services and in many Member States they pay for public service broadcasting.

Employment: There is a skills shortage in ICT in the EU and many disabled people could make a substantial contribution with the appropriate access.

Autonomy and Self Determination: Good ICT design enables disabled and elderly people to be less dependent on carers and increases their autonomy and self determination.

Quality and Usability: Improving the design to include the needs of disabled people improves the design and usability overall.

(reference to standardisation work in DfA, to EdeAN, EIDD and research work)

1.9 Optimal Accessibility

The three stages of Design for All in the previous section illustrate an underlying principle. If society as a whole becomes involved in this process it will increase its market or users, decrease the cost of accessibility and enhance equality of citizenship. There is a need for that process, however, to recognise the boundary between what can be optimally provided by mainstream products and services and what needs to be provided through specialist accessibility technologies.

While the whole of society must take individual and collective responsibility for implementing Design for All, supplying special accessibility technologies should largely be a responsibility for the public sector or its agencies with some assistance from those parts of civil society specifically dedicated to working with disabled and elderly people.

The concept of optimal design takes into account the cost of implementing a feature compared with a realistic number of users likely to benefit from it. The notion of the ratio is important because it provides guidance in such areas as the regulation of different sizes of providers such as television channels. It is necessary to find a balance between the interests of disabled people and their organisations who ask that regulations ensure equal access for all citizens and the interests of providers and suppliers who are afraid that regulation could stifle innovation and growth. A balanced approach to regulation is needed between accessibility and economic viability, particularly for new enterprises so that innovation and growth are encouraged.

1.10 Different regulatory competencies between Member States and the Commission

Because telecommunications and broadcasting require three distinct technical operations, content creation/generation, transmission and reception, they present some very difficult problems for those wishing to secure accessibility. This is also reflected in the diverse assignation of responsibilities in the Member States. While one part of a holistic process, e.g. transmission, may be regulated at EU level, other parts, e.g. content creation/generation and reception is an area of national competence and there is no harmonised requirement, for example under the current Television without Frontiers (TVWF) Directives to provide assistive services.[10] Although the issue of accessibility for people with a disability to television does not fall within the remit of the current TVWF Directive, the Commission will promote accessibility matters with Member States to co-ordinate and complement national actions and measures in the Contact Committee established by the TVWF Directive. In particular, enriching content with audio description, audio subtitling, subtitling and sign language will be further discussed.

This affects the economics of equipment manufacturing and incentives to build in the necessary functionality. In the UK, for example, there is legislation on the creation of accessible television content but the equipment manufacturers do not yet produce equipment with the capability to receive the enrichment streams. The economics of manufacturing mean that the availability of such services in one market does not necessarily provide a sufficient economic incentive for manufacturers and service providers to include the necessary functionality systematically in all relevant products. Frequently the decision does not even depend on consumer electronics manufacturers but another group of players, producers of silicon chips. Assistive services would need to be available in as many Member States as possible in order to provide the necessary incentive for manufacturers. This points towards a need for greater co-ordination between Member States so that assistive services become more widely available, thereby widening the market for equipment and strengthening industry’s economic incentives.

[1] http://europa.eu.int/information_society/topics/telecoms/index_en.htm

[2] Directive 2002/21/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 March 2002 on a common regulatory framework for electronic communications networks and services. OJ L108, 24.2.2002, p.33

[3] Directive 2002/19/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 March 2002 on access to, and interconnection of, electronic communications networks and associated facilities. OJ L 108, 24.4.2002, p. 7

[4] Directive 2002/20/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 March 2002 on the authorisation of electronic communications networks and services. OJ L 108, 24.4.2002, p. 21

[5] Directive 2002/22/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 March 2002 on universal service and users’ rights relating to electronic communications networks and services. OJ L 108, 24.4.2002, p.51

[6] Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector. OJ L 201, 31.7.2002, p.37

[7] Commission Directive 2002/77/EC of 16 September 2002 on competition in the markets for electronic communications networks and services. OJ L 249, 17.09.2002, p. 21

[8] Decision 767/2002/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 March 2002 on a regulatory framework for radio spectrum policy in the European Community. OJ L108, 24.4.2002, p. 1.

[9] Council Directive 2000/78/EC of 27 November 2000 establishing a general framework for equal treatment in employment and occupation. OJ L 303/16, 2.12.2000, p.16

[10] This issue was raised in the Perry Report on the television without Frontiers Directives <Titre>on the application of Directive 89/552/EEC "Television without Frontiers"<DocRef>(2003/2033(INI))