Oxford Local Plan 2036 documents - Disproportionate burden assessments for digital accessibility

Accessibility legislation (on legislation.gov.uk website) states that public sector websites must publish content in an accessible format, unless doing so would impose a disproportionate burden on the organisation. If that is the case, an assessment of the extent to which compliance with the accessibility requirement imposes a disproportionate burden must be carried out.

This is a Disproportionate Burden Assessment for the following Oxford Local Plan 2036 documents which are in PDF format.

• Oxford Local Plan 2016-2036 document
• Oxford Local Plan 2036 Statutory documents
• Oxford Local Plan 2036 Adoption Statement documents
• Oxford Local Plan 2036 Examination Library Document Master List
• Oxford Local Plan 2036 Inspectors' Report document

The benefits of creating accessible versions of these documents would be:

• fully accessible versions for all users to access
• easily searchable and indexable versions

Oxford City Council by decision at the meeting of Full Council on 8 June 2020, formally adopted the Oxford Local Plan 2036. 

The Town and Country Planning (Local Planning) (England) Regulations 2012 require that the local planning authority must make available the Local Plan, the adoption statement and the sustainability appraisal reports. Those regulations state that “availability of documents” includes copies of the documents being made available on the Council’s website. 

The Local Plan itself is 275 pages, the Sustainability Appraisal (and Habitat Regulations Assessment) documentation is a further 344 pages. The Plan was adopted following receipt of the Inspector’s Report which (together with the associated schedule of Main Modifications) is a further 242 pages.   

The Policies Map which accompanies the Local Plan is a complex map with overlapping layers of geographic information and notation. We have made this available on the website as a downloadable document, but to assist with accessibility this is also available as an interactive online map.  

During the production of the Local Plan a large Examination Library of a further 325 documents was assembled to support the work. These documents comprised supporting studies and statements and many were produced by other participants in the process. After the adoption of the Local Plan the Examination Library was removed from the website although a 17 page list of those documents is available to download as a reference and the library documents are available on request. 

The complexity of the documents (including the many maps, tables, graphs and diagrams) together with the volume of material involved, would make the process of making the Oxford Local Plan 2036 webpage fully accessible unreasonably onerous on staff resources.  he time and cost that would be involved in creating accessible versions of this material would be disproportionate. 

Also relevant to this decision are that: 

• We are legally required to make the documents available to the public, so the documents must be published on the Council’s website
• We have not in the past received requests for additionally accessible versions of the documents 
• The documents do meet accessibility requirements for a large number of users, although some groups will find it disproportionately difficult 
• We will always assist with accessible versions on request

The draft plan documents include multiple elements - tables, charts, pictures and text formatted into columns - that may make accessibility difficult. 

We estimate that it would take multiple months to create fully accessible versions the documents and this would place an undue burden on the Council.

We will always assist with accessible versions on request. Email planningpolicy@oxford.gov.uk for assistance.

28 March 2026