Request form inputs to have labels which are readable (programmatically determinable) by assistive technology (accessibility)

[robeastwood-agency]

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
Our accessibility experts reported this concern:

Form inputs must have labels which are readable (programmatically determinable) by assistive technology. Some form inputs are not correctly associated with their labels, making them inaccessible to screen reader users.

When navigating to dropdown menus using VoiceOver on macOS, the screen reader does not announce the label, placeholder text, or the control’s role. Instead, the dropdown automatically opens when focused, skipping expected announcements.
The dropdowns are implemented using <textarea> elements with role="combobox", which may not be reliably interpreted by screen readers.

Describe the solution you'd like
The recommended approach from accessibility experts is:

1. Use instead of <textarea> for the combobox trigger.
2. Add aria-labelledby to explicitly associate the label.
3. Avoid auto-expanding the dropdown on focus. Let users trigger it manually via keyboard or mouse.

Describe alternatives you've considered
None

Additional context
None

[fongsean]

Hi Rob, I think we have initially mentioned that this can't be fixed easily, but turns out we have explicitly added a openOnFocus prop on the relevant components which results in the above behaviour.

I have removed it and the control's label, placeholder text and role is coming through now. This is available in v1.2.6.

[robeastwood-agency]

Thank you Sean, we will test it in v1.2.6+