The Cueva El Soplao accessibility policy

The management, administration, maintenance, conservation, monitoring, investigation, stocktaking, promotion and marketing of the assets and amenities of the Cueva El Soplao tourist complex.

The Cueva El Soplao and all its services are designed to serve the public interest, to make the cultural heritage of Cantabria accessible to the public, to promote tolerance and respect, and to help educate the public on nature.

Our mission is to take responsibility for constructing an important natural and cultural asset, for preserving and making it accessible to the public, for researching the significance of the cave, and for revealing that significance to the public from a diverse and pluralistic pedagogic perspective.

Our commitment to society, nature and the cultural heritage of Cantabria requires us to make universal accessibility one of our main priorities, ensuring that everyone may enjoy the services we offer in a matchless beauty spot.

Since beginning our activity we have been firmly committed to universal accessibility in every possible sphere of our activity. We implemented and certified an accessibility management system under the UNE 170.001-2 standard, thus becoming a pioneer in Cantabria in accessibility management under the standard and the first cave to implement that standard in the whole world.

To achieve this goal we depend on the collaboration of everybody who works at El Soplao, and especially those in direct contact with visitors. Below we list some of the fundamental aspects of this standard affecting everybody performing their activity at El Soplao:

• El Soplao will comply with the applicable accessibility legislation at all levels, with the DALCO accessibility requirements (on ability to walk, awareness, location and communication), with the obligations imposed by permits and licences granted by official bodies, and with the other commitments to which El Soplao signs up.
• El Soplao will establish and keep in place a universal accessibility management system permitting progress and continuous improvement in this field. This system will be adapted to the UNE 170001 standard.
• Everyone at Cueva El Soplao will collaborate on achieving the objectives of the Management System in the performance of the specific tasks delegated to them and in all the routine tasks of their professional work related to accessibility.
• Information on the Universal Accessibility Management System will be disseminated internally to ensure staff know the aspects on which they must all act.
• The system will be a dynamic tool in a permanent state of evolution, both with regard to its structure (e.g. documentation and organisation) and the specific objectives proposed each year. All the staff at El Soplao may propose initiatives in this respect, which will be carefully evaluated.
• Any new projects implemented will take Universal Accessibility into account.

Those basic principles are defined in specific accessibility objectives which are regularly evaluated to verify compliance and establish the necessary measures in case that compliance is undermined.

Awareness of this policy and the participation of everyone in its implementation are essential requirements if our mission is to be fulfilled and our objectives are to be achieved.