Brian Benn
Senior Sergeant Brian Benn, of Dunedin, received the Queen's Service Medal for services to the New Zealand Police. Senior Sergeant Benn joined the New Zealand Police in 1977. In 1984 he joined the Dunedin Search and Rescue, becoming the rescue co-ordinator and, in 1995 he was a founding member of the Dunedin Marine SAR Water Rescue Squad. He pioneered a pager and call-out system for SAR and police volunteers that was subsequently endorsed by an international expert and adopted nationally by the Police. He has been involved in more than 500 rescue missions and is renowned for quickly organising and unifying teams of hundreds of people from disparate organisations. He also has a 15-year involvement with the New Zealand Special Olympics; he was the national ski coach for Alpine Skiing in 2004 and took the New Zealand team to the Special Olympics World Winter Games in 2005.