Readspeaker

Municipality of Gorinchem

ReadSpeaker is a text-to-speech feature on the council’s website that automatically converts text into spoken language. Visitors can have web pages read aloud by clicking a ‘read aloud’ button. The feature makes the website more accessible to people with visual impairments, dyslexia or language difficulties, amongst others, and helps residents to understand the information better.

Last change on 24th of June 2026, at 8:43 (CET) | Publication Standard 1.0

• Publication category: Other algorithms
• Impact assessment: Field not filled in.
• Status: In use

General information

Theme

Organisation and business operations

Begin date

Field not filled in.

Contact information

[e-mail]

Responsible use

Goal and impact

Support for users with visual impairments. In the Netherlands, there are many people who find reading difficult. This can make it hard to understand text on websites. Gorinchem Council has a solution: ReadSpeaker. This is a programme that can read text aloud and translate it. Anyone can use ReadSpeaker. It is safe and has additional features, such as reading aloud in six languages, including Ukrainian. You can also enlarge text and mask the screen.

Considerations

A key benefit of using the ReadSpeaker algorithm is that it makes the council’s website more accessible to a wide range of residents. By automatically reading text aloud, people with visual impairments, dyslexia or limited language skills can understand information more easily. This contributes to inclusive service provision and supports the legal obligations regarding digital accessibility. Furthermore, the feature helps residents find information independently, without the need for additional support from the local authority. A potential drawback is that the speech output is not always entirely natural or error-free, for example when dealing with abbreviations, names or specific technical terms. Furthermore, the use of external technology may raise questions regarding data processing or dependence on a supplier. However, the impact of this is limited because the technology merely converts text from the website into speech and does not make any substantive decisions. The use of the ReadSpeaker algorithm is therefore considered justified. The technology is used exclusively to support the accessibility of existing information, entails a low level of risk and delivers clear social benefits for residents who would otherwise struggle to use digital information.

Human intervention

The text is converted into speech; no human intervention is required.

Risk management

The risk of incorrect answers is very low. There are no privacy risks, as it complies with the GDPR and no data is stored. There is no bias in the answers.

Legal basis

The legal basis for the use of ReadSpeaker lies primarily in the obligation to make digital government information accessible and in the local authority’s public duty to provide information that is understandable and usable for all residents, within the framework of data protection legislation. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1: Levels A and AA 

Links to legal bases

• Digital Accessibility Act (Wdo): https://www.communicatierijk.nl/vakkennis/rijkswebsites/verplichte-richtlijnen/digitale-toegankelijkheid.
• Decree on Digital Accessibility in the Public Sector: https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0040936/
• Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG): https://www.digitoegankelijk.nl/wetgeving/wat-is-verplicht

Operations

Data

All text (content) on the website can be read aloud.

Technical design

The text-to-speech software on our website, ReadSpeaker, incorporates a Deep Neural Network (DNN) algorithm. “ReadSpeaker uses next-generation Deep Neural Network (DNN) technology to structurally improve voice quality at all levels.” This means that ReadSpeaker uses advanced technology – based on neural networks – to structurally improve the quality of text-to-speech conversion.

External provider

ReadSpeaker