Accessibility

We the Marine Institute are committed to providing information and services that are fully accessible to people with disabilities.

Page layout and navigation

Most pages on the website are structured as follows: 

  1. Global links: Jump to content, Home, About Us, Publications, Contact Us, Working with Us, Accessibility, Online Policies, Site Map, Subscriptions, Social Media Links, Share Links, Text Sizer, Language Selection. 
  2. Main navigation: links to the main sections of the web site (Areas of Activity, Infrastructure & Facilities, Research & Funding, Data Services, Ireland’s Marine Resource, News & Events) 
  3. Bread crumb trail: states where you are on the web site now and provides a trail of links from there to the home page. 
  4. Search box: can be used to search for keywords on our website. Search box is located on top right hand corner on every web page.  
  5. Section navigation: When you select a category in the main navigation you will be brought to the main subsection page which has further navigation links to the main subsections within that area. The home page also has direct links to pages within the following main sections Data Services, News and Events, Areas of Activity, research and Funding, Publications, Infrastructure and Facilities. The home page also has a slider image which highlights key activities in the services that we provide.
  6. Content: main content for that page, structured using headings and paragraph elements. 

Standards compliance

The Marine Institute are committed to maintaining this web site in accordance with priority 1 and 2 of the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and the Irish National Disability Authority Guidelines for Web Accessibility. Work on compliance with these guidelines is ongoing, so while all new content should be compliant, some older content may not adhere to these standards at the moment. 

The availability of our font sizer allows text to be resized appropriately across multiple devices and platforms. 

The website uses structured semantic markup. H1 tags are used for main titles, H2 and H3 tags for subtitles.

The website uses cascading style sheets for visual layout. This ensures that content is perfectly linearised and improves performance on a wide range of browsers and other user agents.

Maintaining accessibility

To help deliver and maintain an accessible website, the Institute has published internal guidelines to guide web administrators and authors in the creation of accessible web content.

These guidelines cover issues such as: 

  • Creating user friendly web content 
  • Writing meaningful alternative text 
  • Creating accessible tables 
  • Creating accessible forms 
  • Creating accessible link phrases  

Inquiry Officer

The Institute has appointed two Inquiry Officers to investigate complaints made under Section 38 of the Disability Act, 2005. Any individual can make a complaint to the Inquiry Officer if the Institute has not complied with sections 25, 26, 27 or 28 of the Disability Act 2005. A complaint can be made in person, by telephone or in writing by letter, fax or email. Complaints should be made to the Inquiry Officer. Contact details are as follows: 

Marine Institute 
Rinville
Oranmore 
Galway
Telephone: +353 (0)1 938 7200
Fax: +353 (0)1 938 7200
email:  inquiryofficer@marine.ie

In the event of a complaint:

  • Your concerns will be acknowledged within 2 working days of receipt into the Marine Institute. 
  • If satisfied that a complaint relates to an alleged failure by the Marine Institute to comply with sections 25, 26, 27 or 28 of the Disability Act 2005 a full investigation will be carried out by the Inquiry Officer(s) and appropriate Marine Institute Director. 
  • All staff members are obliged to fully cooperate with the Inquiry officer's investigation. 
  • Where a failure to comply is identified, the Inquiry Officer will outline the steps to be taken to ensure future compliance in the written report that is prepared at the end of each investigation. 
  • A decision will be notified to the complainant within 20 working days from the date of receipt of the complaint via a summary of the findings and decision of the report.