Police Association goes in to bat for baseball cap design
Police officers could soon be donning baseball-style caps if a design lauded as modern and practical gets the green light from bosses.
The New Zealand Police Association is asking officers for feedback on a cap designed by Far North Senior Constable Mark Taylor, as an optional alternative to the current forage cap.
Association director Mike McRandle said baseball caps were practical, comfortable, and ‘‘simply put, they don’t fall off’’.
‘‘Those Canterbury norwesters send many a hat flying, I can assure you,’’ he said.
Occasionally police were allowed to wear uniform baseball caps on specific squads. Initial responses to the new design have been positive.
‘‘I was at a vehicle crash . . . just the other day where this very topic was discussed and the officers attending were in favour of a more operationally fitting option like a cap being available.’’
Frontline police in Australia, Britain and in many American states already wear caps. Taylor’s design was modelled on those.
In England, they have been controversial. Last year, Gloucestershire Constabulary swapped traditional helmets for baseball caps, in a bid to seem more approachable to young people – just as Northamptonshire police stopped wearing them amid fears they didn’t look professional.
McRandle said the police forage cap would always have its place, but ‘‘I suppose the question to ask (is), is there a better option now with how the uniform has changed in the last few years?’’
The association has long spearheaded police uniform changes. In the 1970s, the heavy woollen uniform, which was too hot in summer, was swapped for a lighter fabric.
In 1952, New Zealand’s first female officers were sporting wide-brimmed hats; the impractical design was replaced in 1957 with a felt cap.
The association would work with Taylor to progress his design this year.
‘‘If something as simple as a cap like this will make an officer’s job a bit easier, that can only be a good thing,’’ McRandle said.
Taylor told Police News magazine that the response from top brass so far had been ‘‘lukewarm’’ but that, with the new design, police would be ‘‘moving into the 21st century’’.