Being There

Policing in a small country station is a team effort, as Lynn Elsey discovered.

There’s a good reason why Brevet Sergeant Jeff Allen doesn’t bother to provide directions to the Manna Hill Police Station. The only way you could miss the station would be if you were exceeding the speed limit.

And from all accounts, you can be certain that if you were speeding, you would come to the notice of Brevet Sergeant Allen. Manna Hill, population 10, is located along the Barrier Highway on the edge of South Australia’s Outback, 356 kilometers from Adelaide and 153 kilometres south west of Broken Hill, New South Wales. The heritage-listed police station is one of the few habited buildings in town, along with a hotel and an old railway station.

The image of policing in a oneman station as a solitary endeavour takes a bit of a beating out here. While Brevet Sergeant Allen is the only officer within a half hour drive, it quickly becomes obvious that his cluster colleagues – Brevet Sergeant Matthew Steinbeck, the Officer in Charge at Yunta (43 kilometres south) and Brevet Sergeant Andrew Prevett, who has the same role in Cockburn (104 kilometres north) – operate as a team.

Co u n tr y L iv in g Manna Hill is a place of extremes. According to Brevet Sergeant Allen, temperature variances of 40°C are not uncommon. In the winter it gets down to –2°C at night, with daytime highs from 8 to 13°C. In the summer, it’s just hot. Temperatures are often in the 40s. “The hottest since I’ve been here was 49.5°C,” he says. The dirt is red, foliage is minimal and vistas are uncluttered. “On a clear day, I can see 50 kilometres from my window.”

Brevet Sergeant Allen has been the Officer in Charge at Manna Hill just over three years. After graduating from the Academy in 1991, he worked in Adelaide, Port Lincoln, Hindley Street, Adelaide Traffic and Port Adelaide. Over the years he became interested in working in a country station in the mid north of the state. Why Manna Hill? “It’s a different type of policing,” he said. “The area is dynastic; some families have lived on the stations for over 120 years.

“ It’s a different

type of policing”

[ The cluster team: Brevet Sergeant Steinbeck, Brevet Sergeant Allen and Brevet Sergeant Prevett

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Be i n g T h e r e

“ We’ve all got to be problem solvers ” back to Adelaide. The guy working the till wants to know what I’m doing in the area (alas, my non-native accent gives me away as not being “from around here”). I vaguely mention that I’m working on an article about policing in Manna Hill and he immediately smiles and asks after Brevet Sergeant Allen in what can only be described as a neighbourly tone.

[ Brevet Sergeant Allen ] Sheep stations are the lifeblood of the area.” According to Brevet Sergeant Allen, Manna Hill includes around 28 stations, with most averaging 500 square kilometres. But, as none of the stations are visible from the highway, to the casual visitor Manna Hill seems rather empty – other than the cars, trucks and road trains passing through town. As expected, the highway accounts for most of Brevet Sergeant Allen’s time. According to Brevet Sergeant Allen, traffic policing is the mainstay of the job. But there’s a lot more to the job than just keeping an eye on the traffic. As “the” police station, Brevet Sergeant Allen is responsible for providing all policing duties for the community, from registering vehicles and issuing firearms permits, to sorting out permits for gold fossickers and helping stranded tourists. It includes attending to general enquiries such as answering emails and taking phone calls or perhaps having a kangaroo meat container moved to a more suitable location. Brevet Sergeant Allen says he works a normal roster which he

admits is, “very flexible”. Although he and his cluster colleagues have quite a few kilometres between them, he says they work quite closely with one another, about 75 per cent of the time. They also fill in for one another if and when the situation arises. Brevet Sergeant Allen says that when he first moved to Manna Hill he mainly worked alone, due to vacancies in Yunta and Cockburn. Today there’s no masking the infectious camaraderie amongst the three, reinforcing the importance of teamwork to the job. As the key structure in the Manna Hill community, the police station is always in someone’s sight. “Even on my day off,” Brevet Sergeant Allen says, “if the phone rings or someone knocks on the door, I’ll answer”. As a residential posting, he lives as well as works in the 111-year-old building. As expected in a policing district spreading out over 25,000 square kilometres, a lot of time is spent on the road, which makes it no surprise when his colleague Brevet Sergeant Prevett refers to his vehicle as “our office”. Brevet Sergeant Allen estimates that he averages 400 kilometres

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a day on general patrol duties. He covers the highway as far south as Oodla Wirra and as far north as Cockburn; a span of 207 kilometres. Summer and school holidays are the busiest times along the Barrier Highway. “There are a lot of breakdowns,” he says. “People go off the road in their caravans, get stuck, and require our assistance.” The biggest challenges are accidents, which tend to occur every three months or so. Once or twice a year a heavy vehicle accident takes place, “which are always big”. It is ironic that someone who obviously revels in the low-key atmosphere of a remote posting has managed to become well-known – out in the country as well as in Adelaide. The fallout from a recent incident means that Brevet Sergeant

Allen has temporarily retained a higher profile than desired, which undoubtedly will fade away over time. A brief conversation about the incident leads to the subject of training, which remains highly significant to Brevet Sergeant Allen. “IMOST training is very relevant out here,” he says. “It works, everything becomes instinctive.”

Part of the community

A few minutes later, as a truck driver who regularly plies the highway is helping me put air in my car’s tyres, he learns that I’ve just been in Manna Hill and offers some rather complimentary words about Brevet Sergeant Allen and “the other police guys”. As we take a short tour of the area, Brevet Sergeants Allen, Prevett and Steinbeck seem to be making a conscious effort to downplay the obvious enjoyment they get from

their position. It is as if they feel a bit guilty for having such satisfying jobs; which also provide a crucial service to the community. While they are keen to promote the positive aspects of country station policing, I sense that they would also like to keep it a secret, so that they can continue doing what they do. Obviously distances are factors out here, most pointedly when travel to regional locations or headquarters is involved. As Brevet Sergeant Steinbeck explains: “If I go to court in Port Pirie to follow up on a case from my previous posting, it involves a half day in court, but a total of three days away from Yunta, due to travel”. But the beauty of the cluster concept means that when one colleague is away, the others can fill in. When I ask Brevet Sergeant Allen to name the biggest challenge of working in Manna Hill as opposed

to an urban location, his response is equally positive: “You’ve got to do everything and make assessments as things happen. We’ve all got to be leaders; we’ve all got to be problem solvers.” When I enquire about the best part of the job, the answer comes easily: “Just being there.”

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In Manna Hill, community policing is not just a target or strategy – it is a reality. “We live amongst the community,” Brevet Sergeant Allen says. “We know everyone, people trust us.” The reality of his statement comes to life a few hours later when I stop at the servo in Yunta, on my way

The Name Game For such a simple town, Manna Hill has a rather complicated situation regarding its name. The official and legal usage is two words, Manna Hill. However some maps, road signs and parts of SAPOL refer to the town as one word, Mannahill. The heritage-listed Railway Station also uses this spelling. The town was proclaimed on 10 March 1887 and officially gazetted in 1986 as Manna Hill. According to historical notes, the name “Manna” was derived from biblical origins. Records also note the town being named after an old eating house in the area. However, any formal or informal evidence of the town’s name being changed from one word, Mannahill, to its current official status has yet to be discovered.

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