Mr. Speaker, with regard to (a), the Standard on Web Usability came into effect on September 28, 2011, and was updated on March 31, 2013.
With regard to (b), the Standard on Web Usability is issued under the authority of section 7 of the Financial Administration Act by the Secretary of the Treasury Board, pursuant to subsection 6(4) of the Financial Administration Act and section 3.5 of the Policy on Management of Information Technology.
With regard to (c), the Standard on Web Usability was developed through an extensive review of existing studies and reports, including usability studies that had been conducted by various consulting firms on Government of Canada websites from 2002-2010; studies and reports from Wichita State University, Nielsen Norman Group, Usability.gov, A List Apart, Stanford University, and University of Washington; and a review of other jurisdictions’ websites.
With regard to (d), the results of the studies with regard to colour revealed that approximately 75% of them use blue or green as their primary colour.
With regard to (e), research conducted for the development of the Standard on Web Usability was not contracted out.
With regard to (f), the research was conducted using internal resources within existing budgets. The Standard on Web Usability was developed using internal resources within existing budgets.
With regard to (g) and (h), departments are required to implement the changes within existing resources. Departments are encouraged to implement changes at the same time as other updates.