A report by the United Kingdom (U.K.) Cabinet Office’s e-Government Unit found that disabled people could not browse 97 per cent of official government sites in Europe, mainly because they ignored several known techniques for making the websites accessible.

The survey found that only 3 per cent of the websites passed basic tests on accessibility set down by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).The standards used by the W3C include navigational features that make accessing websites easier for disabled people and the compatibility with software packages designed to convert data into a more accessible format.

To improve the situation, the report suggested that governments might have to pay penalties and compensation to those citizens unable to use the sites. It is estimated that 39 million people in Europe have some form of disability.

The report surveyed 440 public service websites across Europe.

It was carried out in collaboration with the Royal National Institute for the Blind and the Royal National Institute for the Deaf.