Accessibility Policy

Our Policies > Accessibility Policy

Created 2025/09/12

Accessibility Statement

Carnelian Web Services is committed to ensuring equal access and participation for disabled people. We are committed to treating disabled people in a way that allows them to maintain their dignity and independence.

We believe in integration, and we are committed to meeting the needs of disabled people in a timely manner. We will do so by removing and preventing barriers to accessibility and by meeting our accessibility requirements under Ontario’s accessibility laws.

Principles

We follow the social model of disability

The social model of disability suggests that if all the barriers to access were removed, disabled people could be full participants in society. This model was developed by disability rights activists in the 1970s and 80s.

“If everyone was taught sign language at an early age, a deaf person would no longer be disadvantaged. If towns were built and planned with physical disabilities in mind and there was no social stigma attached to looking or sounding different, then having a physical impairment would no longer be disabling.” 

~ Nancy Doyle (2020), We Have Been Disabled: How The Pandemic Has Proven The Social Model Of Disability

The social model of disability prefers the term “disabled people” because people are disabled by barriers to inclusion. Contrast this with “person with a disability” (also known as “person-first” terminology). Saying “person with a disability” tends to resemble the medical model of disability, which regards the condition as inherently disabling, in need of medical intervention, and something that can be fixed by modifying the person instead of making the environment more accessible.

Person-first terminology may be more appropriate when talking about a specific condition (e.g., a person with dyslexia, a person with chronic fatigue). But we will always be guided by how people describe themselves.

Nothing about us without us

This is a general principle adopted by the disability rights movement in the 1990s, which emphasizes that any decision or discussion which affects disabled people should involve them from the outset, not as an afterthought.

In 2004, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan stated that “no society can claim to be based on justice and equality without persons with disabilities taking decisions as full-fledged members”.

Our Accessibility Policy

1. We use people’s preferred terminology for their disability. We avoid stigmatizing language.
2. Nothing about us without us. We commit to involving disabled people in any decisions involving or affecting their wellbeing.
3. Creating accessible content and software. All our websites, software, training materials, and other communications (invoices, quotes, statements, videos) will be provided in accessible formats, in a manner that takes into account the needs of the audience.
4. Providing alternatives and accessible environments. If we organize events, we will strive to provide perfume-free, wheelchair-accessible, inclusive environments, food options, and whatever else is needed to create a safe, welcoming, stress-free environment.
5. Everything we do should uphold the principles of dignity, independence, integration and equal opportunity for disabled people.