This Regional News Media report (2022) is the first of three over as many years investigating the impact of contraction of regional media in New South Wales on metro coverage of news and issues significant to Australia which originate in non-urban areas.

In the first years, based on a quantitative study of regional issues covered by metro outlets, including print, radio and television, the centre has found mixed levels of coverage, with some having higher local coverage than others, including the ABC which has a large regional presence.

The report has also found the largest subjects of coverage by metro outlets were court and crime stories, followed by local government and national sport; very few stories focused on arts and culture, science, and social issues and none concerned indigenous issues. Significantly, the report found the majority of stories covered in metro outlets originated as responsive reportage to outside events and were not the result of the outlets own effort. Editors uniformly cited the difficulty of finding freelance reporters and of recruiting journalists to regional locations. However, the report also found in research interviews conducted with regional audiences that there is strong agreement that representation in metro media is important but that metro media often does not meet audience expectations because it sensationalises, misinterprets and misrepresents facts on the ground.