Albanese hasresisted calls to alter the referendum question and refused to name the date,saying only that it would be in the final quarter of the year.
But while the prime minister insists many voters will pay attention only in the final weeks,theofficial Yes andNo referendum pamphlets that will be sent to Australian households were launched this week,and both campaigns are furiously fundraising and holding town hall meetings. No campaign outfit Advance on Friday asked supporters to chip in $825,000 for an advertising blitz.
Resolve director Jim Reed said the latest survey showed the overall result was still quite close,“but the referendum requires that the Yes vote wins in a majority of states too,and that goal is looking like a more distant prospect”.
“NSW is now the fourth state to be voting No,and Victoria and Tasmania are trending in the same direction. The current position,combined with the unwavering trend,certainly makes a No result the most likely outcome at this stage,” he said.
Bragg said on Friday the referendum should be delayed to ensure it was not defeated and the question being put to voters should be altered.
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“A simple,clean amendment would have been much easier to attract more support and an exposure draft bill would have meant the detail questions[from the No camp] were not there,” he said.
“It’s clear the centre ground is falling away and NSW was always going to be the barometer state. It’s the product,not the marketing,that needs close examination at this juncture.”
A spokeswoman for the prime minister pointed to his refrain of “if not now,when” regarding the timing of the referendum.
Bragg’s fellow NSW Liberal MP and Yes supporter,Julian Leeser,said he did not support delaying the vote and argued that while people had doubts,the rise in the number of undecided voters showed there was still a chance to win people over.
“I think there is a lot on the minds of Australians at the moment and they just haven’t focused. Once the cases[for Yes and No] arrive in letterboxes,once the date has been set,that’s when people start to focus,” he said.
“It’s a good change,a safe change and it will make a difference for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.”
But one of the No campaign leaders,Nyunggai Warren Mundine,said the Yes campaign had treated Australians like mugs and insulted them by suggesting a vote for No was racist.
“I always thought this would be like the republic referendum. It will lose every state and the national vote. It will be a complete loss for the Yes campaign,” he said.
Support for the Voice held steady at 63 per cent among Labor voters – the same figure as June but down from 75 per cent in April – and at 26 per cent among Coalition voters. It increased by 2 percentage points among Greens voters to 83 per cent,while 72 per cent of “other” voters opposed it.
The Resolve survey found just 31 per cent of voters now believed the referendum would succeed,down from 38 per cent last month. Forty-seven per cent of voters expected the No campaign to win,up from 30 per cent,while 22 per cent were unsure,down from 32 per cent a month ago.
Voters did not welcome big business support for the Voice campaign – something Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has criticised – with just 29 per cent agreeing that corporate involvement was appropriate and 44 per cent saying it was not.
And following a recent call from Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney for the Voice to focus onhealth,education,jobs and housing,the poll found 33 per cent of voters believed improved healthcare should be its priority,32 per cent of people nominated improved services in remote communities,30 per cent chose tackling crime,and 26 per cent said education services. People were able to choose up to four priorities.
About a third of voters,at 32 per cent,said the Voice should be able to provide advice on issues that affected only Indigenous Australians,29 per cent backed the body providing advice on issues that mainly affected Indigenous Australians,and 18 per cent favoured it giving advice on any issues,with the rest undecided.
While the national figures reported here come from a survey of 1610 voters conducted from July 12 to 15,the state-by-state results are drawn from two surveys in June and July to gain a higher sample size. The questions were identical in the two surveys and the national results have a margin of error 2.4 per cent.
The state figures are based on questions to 3216 voters,including 1012 in NSW and 1003 in Victoria,along with smaller groups in smaller states.
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