European Council Launches Eur-Lex Website for Blind Legal Researchers

A presentation of the new EUR-Lex (European law) site for blind people took place in the Council Press Center on 4 December 2003.

Mr Thomas Cranfield, Director-General of the Publications Office, introduced the presentation, followed by a practical demonstration of the EUR-Lex site by a blind person.

The presentation was open to the public.

As a contribution to the European Year of People with Disabilities, this new version of EUR-Lex will help to meet the needs of the broadest range of users wishing to access European Union legal documents. Specialised encoding of the EUR-Lex site opens it to consultation via software and tools used by people with disabilities, thereby offering easier access to legal texts and contributing to better dissemination of legal information on the internet.

EUR-Lex offers access to the EU Treaty texts, the Official Journal of the European Union, legislation in force, consolidated texts of legislation as well as to preparatory documents for legislation, case-law of the European Court of Justice and Parliamentary questions.

Interest in electronic legal sources is constantly increasing and by the end of 2003, 140 million documents will have been visualised on EUR-Lex.

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