No Helmet, No Training, Q.E.D.
If you cannot wear the safety equipment, provided by the Force to protect you while undergoing riot training, firearms training or other confrontational training, then you should not be asking to be given the role.
It may feel good that you are being given equal rights along others; it may be that you can gain credit for being a highly paid police firearms user. But to gain equal rights, you have to demonstrate equal opportunity and when some colleagues are able to wear the safety equipment, and you choose not to, then you should not get the training.
You are self excluding and that has nothing to do with equal rights. It has everything to do with making your colleagues more vulnerable. If you get killed or injured because you refused to wear a bullet proof helmet or chest protector, then you are placing an increased burden on your colleagues around you and one of them could get killed or injured looking after you.
I understand the need for some to act within the scope of their Faith, however, when that Faith requirement impacts upon the safety of colleagues and members of the public, your employer should do whatever they can to protect those whom would be endangered by your actions.
There are anti-ballistic headdress options, sadly, the manufacturers charge an exorbitant price and demand a very high purchase rate over a budget period. For the numbers taking up the option, some forces simply cannot justify the cost of entering into the purchase. Some headdress options, acceptable to some, are not acceptable to others, so the spending costs are extreme and simply not cost effective.
Take for instance two recent headlines:
1) The Indian Army do not have bullet proof turbans
2) Police Force blows £100,000 on failed search to find a helmet to cover a Sikh officer’s turban.
One thinks it odd, some people will happily wear a motorcycle crash helmet, but not a riot helmet.
Even more odd when evidence exists of a Sikh military metal headdress!
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