The Office of the E-envoy accepted demands from the Welsh Language Board that sites should be bilingual.

Much of the government's key UK Online portal is already available in Welsh.

Now, Whitehall's web design handbook has adopted the board's guidelines under the provision of the Welsh Language Act.

E-envoy Andrew Pinder is adding Welsh to the web

It means all government organisations serving the public in Wales should incorporate both Welsh and English in their sites.

The requirement was a key plank of evidence given by the Welsh Language Board in a consultation exercise in 2001.

Board chair Rhodri Williams said in a statement: "This is excellent news both for the board and for the language itself.

"Statutory organisations operating in Wales will now have to consider the two languages when developing their sites on the internet.

Bilingual domains

"We are in a unique situation to offer advice to the UK Government here at the board.

"Providing advice on topics such as bilingual domain names for websites, equal prominence to both languages and direct navigation between parallel pages, is part of our everyday work.

"Our recommendations are all examples of best practice, and we are delighted that such an important document for those involved in developing websites includes all our advice and recommendations."

Web-savvy Mr Williams is keenly interested in opportunities for the Welsh language to harness new media and would have been central in driving the policy into the new Handbook On Web Design.

Microsoft Windows

He sees as crucial Welsh-language provision on websites and in computer software.

The board recently welcomed Microsoft's inclusion of Welsh-language spellchecking tools in its releases of Windows XP and Office.

A previous version of the UK Government's handbook had warned Welsh-language provision could not be achieved if management was poor.

The latest guidelines state "Welsh content should be as easy for the public to access as the English content" and point to the Welsh Assembly and Welsh Language Board websites as hallmarks of bilingualism.