WANTED: Cops.

Singaporean police officers who are retired or retiring soon may now have the option of choosing a second career - that of being a cop in New Zealand.

Mr Lincoln Tan, a reporter formerly based in Singapore and now based in Auckland, reported in The New Zealand Herald that an agreement has been reached in principle between the police commissioners of both countries, to recruit police officers from Singapore.

When contacted by The New Paper, the Singapore Police Force (SPF) confirmed that it is holding exploratory talks with the New Zealand Police.

The talks are part of its Career Transition Framework, which offers pre-retirement programmes to facilitate officers' transition to retirement and a possible second career.

The recruitment of the Singaporean officers is expected to improve law enforcement in New Zealand, a country facing a changing population mix.

The Asian population there is growing faster than any other ethnic group - at an annual rate of 3.4 per cent.

And the Kiwi police's aim is this: Build a police force that has the same ethnic make-up as the communities it serves.

'We need a police force that represents and can interact with the population,' Inspector John Mitchell told the New Zealand Herald.

Insp Mitchell is the police development manager for Auckland and the man behind the idea.

He told the New Zealand Herald that officers from Singapore would be recruited in groups of 20, and will probably go through a 10-week conversion programme.

The Singaporean recruits will join Vietnamese and Indian recruits already undergoing training.

PROPOSAL

Insp Mitchell made the proposal in January last year, after a month-long trip here in 2005 to study policing systems and operations.

'Singapore has a similar size force serving the same population size, and their policing ethos are remarkably similar to ours,' he was quoted as saying.

'Being a multicultural city, Singaporean police officers will also have the language and cultural understanding capabilities to help improve our Asian responsiveness.'

NZ police has been recruiting from the United Kingdom since 2003 and have been looking at Asian countries with a shared colonial heritage, including Hong Kong and Malaysia, to meet its need for more Asian officers.

According to the 2007 police annual report, only 1.6 per cent who work for New Zealand police are of Asian descent.

Police national strategic adviser Kefeng Chu reportedly said recently that each time the police had an applicant who was an ethnic minority, it was 'like striking gold'.

New Zealand Police national recruitment and appointments manager Deborah Chan confirmed with the New Zealand Herald that talks are ongoing with the Singapore Police Force and Singapore's Department of Manpower.

But she added that the talks are still at a preliminary stage.

TRANSIT

A SPF spokesman told The New Paper:

'The SPF sees retirement as a major milestone in an officer's working career.

'Some officers may opt to take it easy upon retirement and spend their time with their families. Others may prefer transit into a second career, enriched with experiences acquired in their career in the SPF.'

The Career Transition Framework helps them do that.

Its programmes are customised to the needs of officers and kick in four to five years before the officer's retirement.

They include programmes on psychological and mental preparation, financial planning and topics such as how to put up a resume.

It also facilitates job placements and the sharing of job information.

But will our boys be welcome in New Zealand?

New Zealand First, a political party which takes a strong anti-Asian immigration stance, told the New Zealand Herald that it has no objections.

'We would be concerned if recruiting was done in countries which sits lowly on the corruption index,' said MP Ron Mark, its law and order spokesman.

Bringing in police officers from Singapore is 'different' - because it meant bringing in 'quality Asian immigrants'.

Additional reporting by Ng Tze Yong

This article was first published in The New Paper on April 10, 2008.