Television and on-demand programme services: Access services report Jan - Dec 2020

In 2020, channels continued to meet or exceed their requirements to provide access services. We recognise this has been particularly challenging in the context of the last year as the Coronavirus pandemic raised a number of issues for broadcasters in producing and delivering access services. Ofcom welcomes the efforts that broadcasters have made in ensuring that programmes have remained accessible during this time.

Domestic channels with an audience share of between 0.05% and 1% have the option either to broadcast 60 minutes of sign-presented programming each month or to participate in Ofcom-approved alternative arrangements which contribute to the availability of sign-presented programming. Where "Alt" is shown in the report, this indicates that the broadcaster contributed to the British Sign Language Broadcasting Trust (BSLBT), which commissions sign-presented programming and is broadcast on the channels Film4 and Together.

Following the end of the Brexit transition period, none of the non-domestic broadcasters that previously had a requirement to provide access services remain licensed with Ofcom. We have therefore not reported on their provision for the second half of 2020. Details of the level of provision in the first half of 2020 can be found in our previous report available here.

Ofcom regulates a wide range of ODPS, including public service broadcasters’ catch-up services, subscription film services and local TV archives.  We require ODPS providers to submit twice-yearly data on the extent to which they make their services accessible to people with sight and/or hearing impairments. The number of providers responding can vary, which should be taken into account when comparing data with previous years.

We are aware that the Coronavirus pandemic has had an adverse effect on the production of access services.  Nevertheless, a greater proportion of providers responding to this request appear to have been offering subtitles (63.8% up from 58.1% in 2019). A slightly smaller proportion of providers were offering audio description (16.7% down from 17.4%) and signing (11.4% down from 12.8%).

On the services and platforms where access services were provided, there are small increases in the proportion of content made accessible: 58.1% of programming hours were subtitled in 2020 (up from 51.2% in 2019), 14.2% were audio described (up from 9.7%) and 2.4% were signed (up from 1.5%).

Figure 1 below gives more detail on audio described content, for ease of use with screen readers. Please see the interactive report for further information on the provision of all access services.

Figure 1: UK services carrying audio description during the calendar year 2020

*Turner’s figures show AD provided to platforms but not necessarily played out to consumers.