The Welsh Language Standards and your website: what the standards say, who is bound, and how to comply

The Welsh Language Standards require a bound organisation's website to have the text of every page in Welsh, every Welsh page fully functional, and the Welsh language treated no less favourably than English, with the interface and menus in Welsh and any app working fully in Welsh. They bind public bodies named in regulations, reach suppliers and grant recipients through contracts and conditions, and do not bind private businesses. The Welsh Language Commissioner investigates complaints and the Measure caps the civil penalty at £5,000. This guide quotes the standards, explains the phrase that matters, and ends with the checklist we build to.

Where the standards come from

The Welsh Language (Wales) Measure 2011 gave Welsh official status in Wales, created the office of the Welsh Language Commissioner, and replaced the old Welsh language schemes with a system of standards. The standards themselves are set out in regulations made by the Welsh Government, the first in 2015 for councils, national park authorities and Welsh ministers, and further sets since for police and fire services, universities and colleges, health boards and NHS trusts and other bodies, the eighth set in 2022. A body becomes bound when the Commissioner serves it a compliance notice listing which standards apply to it and from when.

What the standards say about websites

The service delivery standards in the first set of regulations include, on websites, the following. Standard 52: the text of each page of your website is available in Welsh, every Welsh language page on your website is fully functional, and the Welsh language is not treated less favourably than the English language. Standard 53 applies the same test to the home page, and standard 54 to any page you publish. Standard 56: provide the interface and menus on every page of your website in Welsh. Standard 57: all apps that you publish must function fully in Welsh, and the Welsh language must be treated no less favourably than the English language. Standard 83, on corporate identity, adds that when you form, revise or present your corporate identity you must not treat the Welsh language less favourably, which reaches the logo, the strapline and the name in the header.

The numbering differs between the sets of regulations, so a compliance notice for a health board or a university may number the same duties differently. The content is the same three ideas: the text in Welsh, the Welsh pages working, and no less favourable treatment.

What no less favourably means on a website

The standards do not describe a design. They describe a comparison. For every part of the site the question is whether the Welsh experience is worse, later, slower or smaller than the English one, and if it is, the standard is breached. In practice that means the Welsh page published on the same day as the English; the same content, not a summary; forms, error messages, confirmation pages and emails in Welsh; the menus, the footer, the search and the cookie banner in Welsh on Welsh pages; documents available in Welsh or the Welsh page saying plainly that a document is English only; the Welsh version not hidden behind an English landing page; and the switch on every page opening the same page in the other language. A Welsh version that loads more slowly because it is served through a translation layer is treated less favourably, and so is one whose search results show English titles.

Who is bound, who is asked, who chooses

Bound: the bodies named in the regulations and served a compliance notice, which now includes the Welsh Government, the 22 councils, the national park authorities, the health boards and NHS trusts, universities and further education colleges, the police and fire services and a range of other public bodies. Some third-sector bodies are bound too: WCVA, the umbrella body for voluntary organisations in Wales, has been under standards since January 2017.

Asked: a supplier delivering a public-facing service under contract to a bound body, because the body's own duties extend to services delivered on its behalf and the contract normally says so; and a charity or community organisation whose grant from the Welsh Government, a council or the National Lottery Community Fund asks how the project will serve Welsh speakers. Nothing in the Measure binds the supplier's or the charity's website directly; the contract or the grant condition does, and it usually asks for the same test.

Choosing: any business or charity that wants to serve Welsh speakers well. The Commissioner's Cynnig Cymraeg, the Welsh Offer, recognises organisations that publish what they will offer in Welsh and then do it. Private businesses are not subject to standards and the Commissioner's approach to them is voluntary.

Complaints and penalties

A member of the public who finds a bound body's site failing the test can complain to the body and to the Commissioner. The Commissioner can investigate, decide whether a standard was breached, and require the body to take steps; the Measure allows a civil penalty, capped at £5,000, as well as publication of the decision. In practice the published decisions are the sharper cost: they name the body and the failure, and a website that treated Welsh less favourably is the kind of finding that a council or a health board would rather not have on record.

The checklist we build to

• A Welsh page for every English page at its own address, published the same day.
• Menus, footer, search, cookie banner and every interface element in Welsh on the Welsh pages.
• Forms, validation messages, confirmation pages and automated emails in Welsh.
• Welsh titles, descriptions and social previews so search results appear in the right language.
• The language switch on every page, opening the same page, with the choice remembered.
• Documents available in Welsh, or the Welsh page stating plainly where one is not.
• The logo, strapline and name treating Welsh no less favourably.
• Fonts checked for ŵ, ŷ and the grave and acute forms of w and y.
• A process for updates that makes it impossible to change one language without the other.
• A named person responsible for the Welsh version and a log of when each page was last checked.

The failures we see most

If you hold a compliance notice, send it with the site and we will check the site against it page by page. If you hold a contract or a grant letter, the same, against the clause that asks.