The majority of uniforms worn by the Armed Forces of Malta (AFM) include trousers, and are therefore considered to be gender neutral, according to a spokesperson from the disciplined corps.

The Malta Independent contacted the AFM following a public statement on Facebook by Police Union Chief Sandro Camilleri, who expressed his support for gender neutral police uniforms, after a police officer, assigned female at birth, requested to wear the male police uniform, occurring for the first time within the police force.

This newspaper asked AFM whether there are uniforms in the military assigned for males and females, whether the organisation is in favour of gender neutral uniforms and how instances would be handled whereby an employee asks to wear a different uniform, a situation similar to that mentioned by Camilleri.

"The Armed Forces of Malta has what are called 'Standing Orders' that regulate what its members should wear for different occasions," said an AFM spokesperson.

"The majority of these uniforms are with trousers, and hence are considered gender neutral. In addition, in 2014, the normal daily uniform (which consisted of trousers for male and a skirt for females) was changed to the combat uniform which is trousers-based."

"Whenever an issue to wear different uniforms was raised, this was handled without any problems," they added.

Earlier this week, Silvan Agius, Director for Human Rights and Integration within the Ministry for European Affairs and Equality and Member of the LGBTIQ consultancy council told this newspaper that the best option would be for a workplace to make all 'gendered' options available to all individuals for them to wear what they feel most comfortable in.

Agius replied  that he would opt for having more than one option, and would remove the 'male' and 'female' categories on the uniforms. "I would go for the latter and I would also remove any unnecessary differentiation," he said.

"A workplace could, for example, make all options available to the individual, and it will be up to the employee to pick and choose what suits them best," said Agius.