SAIF: SAIF Annual Report 2012
Significant Issues and Developments in 2011
Funding
2011/12 was the first of a three year provisional funding cycle, the first time our funding has not been guaranteed for the full 3 years. Funding was guaranteed for the first year, with the second and third years relying on the Scottish Government (SG) spending review and SAIF finding a new host organisation, as our current host Consumer Focus Scotland will cease to exist by March 2013.
Despite these difficulties SAIF was able to meet its priority targets through the efforts of the SAIF members and staff, and again proved to be very good value for money. In December, our funding for the following 2 years was confirmed.
Staffing
At the end of September, long time SAIF worker Steve Harvey retired. Due to the recruitment freeze we were unable to recruit a replacement worker. We submitted a revised work plan to the SG based on the reduced worker hours which was accepted and we were able to put the salary underspend into our work plan.
New publications
In October we produced a new short booklet A Brief Guide to Making Your Information Accessible which is designed to be used electronically as it has links to useful guidance and fact sheets.
We revised our SAIF information leaflets and produced 2 versions in colour. An A5 leaflet and a smaller, fun size leaflet which folds out.
We worked in partnership with UPDATE who produced its Access Guide wall poster and an information leaflet to promote its online Scottish Formats Resource.
Regular enewsletters promoting the new material have gone out with links directly to our site and we have received positive feedback.
We wrote a blog style article on using accessibility toolbars to gauge accessibility, which we put on our website and then tweeted. We used the SAIF website as a case study and we were able to make a few tweaks to our site as a result