It's a three-hour drive from Canberra to Wagga Wagga but when it comes to the Indigenous Voice to Parliament the two cities couldn't be further apart.
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This week media company ACM, the publisher of this masthead, has revealed the results of a survey of more than 10,000 voters across metropolitan cities, regional centres and rural areas.
It shows that only 38 per cent of people say they will vote "yes" at the Voice referendum, expected to be held in October, while 55 per cent say they expect to vote "no".
In the regions the survey shows the "no" vote grows to 57 per cent while the "yes" vote shrinks to 35 per cent.
Dig deeper into the different survey responses of the readers of each of ACM's daily newspapers and the complexity of the nation-wide challenge facing the "Yes" campaign looms large.
From the Newcastle Herald north of Sydney to The Canberra Times in the ACT, Victoria's Bendigo Advertiser and The Examiner in Launceston in northern Tasmania, the ACM network's 14 daily newspapers and their local news websites serve some of Australia's largest regional population centres as well as the nation's capital.
Doubts about the landmark changes proposed by the Albanese government appear the strongest in regional NSW, where 72 per cent of readers of Dubbo's The Daily Liberal indicated they would vote "no" at the referendum and only 21 per cent indicated support for altering the Constitution to recognise the First Peoples of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.
In Wagga, where The Daily Advertiser traces its origins back to 1868 and counts former deputy prime minister and Riverina MP Michael McCormack among it former editors, only one in four respondents said they were likely to vote "yes", compared to 65 per cent for "no" and a large 10 per cent still undecided.
Other "no" strongholds in NSW included Tamworth in Barnaby Joyce's New England electorate, where 66 per cent of Northern Daily Leader readers were in the "no" camp, and Bathurst, where 61 per cent of Western Advocate readers were "no".
On the NSW-Victorian border, 63 per cent of survey respondents who counted themselves among the Albury/Wodonga readership of ACM's The Border Mail said they would reject the Voice at the referendum. The region's federal MPs are independent Helen Haines, who supports a "yes" vote, and deputy Liberal leader Sussan Ley.
Support for the Voice is strongest in the ACT, where more than half of respondents who said they were readers of The Canberra Times - 53 per cent - indicated they'd vote "yes".
The largely urban and suburban coastal cities of Wollongong and Newcastle had the next healthiest "yes" support, with 45 per cent of Illawarra Mercury readers and 43 per cent of Newcastle Herald readers saying they would vote for change.
But even in the Labor heartland of Newcastle, more than half of those surveyed - 53 per cent - said they expected to vote "no".
The proposal to establish an independent body to advise Parliament and the executive government on matters affecting Indigenous people will only go ahead if a majority of voters approve nationally, as well as a majority of voters in at least four of the six states.
In Tasmania, a crucial state for the "yes" campaign, 39 per cent of readers of Launceston's 180-year-old The Examiner said they'd back the Voice, with 55 per cent against. In north-west Tasmania around Burnie, home of firebrand independent Senator Jacquie Lambie, survey respondents who read The Advocate were 35 per cent "yes" versus "59 per cent "no".
Across Victoria, Voice support ranged from 36 per cent among Ballarat readers of The Courier, 35 per cent for the Warrnambool audiences of The Standard to 32 per cent among Bendigo Advertiser readers. The "no" vote was almost 60 per cent in each, with 10 per cent still undecided in Bendigo.
A state by state split of the results across ACM's daily readerships shows the ACT with the strongest "yes" vote (53 per cent), followed by NSW (36 per cent) which also had the most undecided (8 per cent). The "no" vote was strongest in Victoria (59 per cent).
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