By Nathaniel Clarkson

Imagine building a state-of-the-art library, filling it with essential resources, and then installing a heavy, un-openable door that locks out 20% of your community. Then, imagine paying expensive staff members to stand outside that door and read the books aloud to the people who can’t get in.

This sounds absurd, yet it is exactly what is happening in UK local government digital services right now.

We are currently facing a “Compliance Clash.” In our zeal to satisfy GDPR (Privacy) and Cyber Security regulations, we have accidentally created a “Brute Force Lockout” for disabled and neurodiverse residents.

The result? Unlawful denial of service, frustrated residents, and a financial black hole costing the public sector millions.

There is a solution. It’s called Watch, Listen, Read.

The Missing Link: Where Compliance Collides

The current digital landscape is a minefield for residents with access needs:

1. The Privacy Trap: A blind user using a screen reader visits a council site. A GDPR cookie banner pops up. The “Reject All” button isn’t coded for keyboard navigation. The user is stuck. They cannot consent, and they cannot proceed.
2. The Security Block: A visually impaired resident tries to pay Council Tax. They are met with a visual CAPTCHA asking them to “identify the traffic lights.” They cannot pass.
3. The Information Wall: A resident with low literacy or aphasia needs social care info but finds only a dense, 20-page PDF. It is cognitively impenetrable.

In all three cases, the website—the “cheap” channel—has failed.

The Solution: Watch, Listen, Read

We need to stop treating Accessibility, Privacy, and Content as separate silos. We propose a new unified standard: Watch, Listen, Read.

This is a two-part ecosystem:

1. The “One-Stop Shop” Format

We move beyond “Text by Default.” Every essential piece of information is presented proactively in three simultaneous formats to meet our Anticipatory Duty under the Equality Act:

• WATCH: A short, captioned video summary for neurodiverse users or those with low literacy.
• LISTEN: An audio version (podcast style) for visually impaired users or those on the move.
• READ: Clear, structured HTML text (not PDF) compatible with screen readers.

2. The Privacy & Accessibility Passport

We are developing a tool that bridges the gap between GDPR and Access. Instead of fighting a cookie banner on every site, the user sets their profile once (e.g., “I use a screen reader; reject non-essential tracking”). When they visit a council site using this tool, it “handshakes” with the website to:

• Auto-dismiss the banner based on pre-set consent.
• Bypass visual CAPTCHAs using alternative verification.
• Automatically serve the audio or easy-read version of the content.

The Financial Case: The Cost of Failure Demand

Why does this matter to the bottom line? Because every time a user is locked out of a website, they don’t disappear. They phone you.

This is called “Failure Demand” – demand caused by a failure in the system to do something right the first time.

Let’s look at the economics of Channel Shift (moving contact from phone/face-to-face to digital):

• Cost of a Web Transaction: ~£0.15
• Cost of a Phone Transaction: ~£5.00+
• The “Tax” on Inaccessibility: Every time a resident is forced to call because they couldn’t get past a CAPTCHA, it costs the council 33 times more to handle that query.

The Napkin Math: Potential Savings

Let’s estimate the cost of this “Digital Lockout.”

At a Regional Council Level:

• Assume a catchment of 150,000 households.
• Approx 20% identify as having a disability or access need (~30,000 households).
• If just 10% of those households are forced to call the council twice a year because the website was inaccessible (PDFs, CAPTCHAs, Cookie Banners):
  • Calculation: 6,000 avoidable calls x £5.00 per call.
  • Annual Waste: £30,000 per council.
  • (Note: This is a conservative estimate. Including Face-to-Face appointments caused by digital exclusion, this figure could easily triple to £100k+).

At a National Level (UK Wide):

• There are 317 local authorities in England alone.
• If every council is losing a conservative £30,000 a year to this “Failure Demand”:
  • Calculation: 317 x £30,000.
  • National Annual Waste: £9.5 Million.

£9.5 million. That is the estimated amount the public sector is spending annually simply because our websites are fighting with our users.

The Legal Reality

Beyond the money, there is the law.

If a council service is behind a barrier that a blind resident cannot pass, we are not just having a “tech issue.” We are unlawfully denying service under the Equality Act 2010. We are failing in our duty to make reasonable adjustments.

Legal precedents like Latif v Project Management Institute have shown that “security protocols” are not a valid defence for discrimination.

The Way Forward

We cannot continue to patch these holes with retrofitted PDFs and expensive call centre staff. We need a fundamental shift in how we deliver information.

Watch, Listen, Read is not just an accessibility feature; it is an efficiency engine. By unlocking the digital door for the 20% of the population we are currently excluding, we don’t just avoid lawsuits—we save millions in taxpayer money, and more importantly, we restore dignity to our digital services.

It’s time to stop blocking our own residents. It’s time to Watch, Listen, and Read.