I live on the mainland of Australiana, and my local range did a survey of the shooters for a few months where everyone had to write down what chamberings they were shooting that day, and at the end of it the .308 had been entered 50% of the time. And its mostly all individual hunters sighting in rifles, not target shooters or club people etc. So its a clear win for the .308 over here. Of the other 50% the 7mm08 led,, and then after that was the .270 and .243 neck and neck followed by everything else.
There is not many people using .303's any more, you will see about as many old 6.5x55's as you will old .303's, and then it seems to be just old guys dragging it out for a shot for old times sake, rather than people who seriously hunt with them.
The Tikka T3 changed the game, opened the doors to other manufacturers making cheap plastic bolt actions, and the price for a decent shooting rifle came down. Ruger, Savage, Howa etc. It mean that all those guys who would have used their Dad's old .303 could afford to go and buy Savage Axises and Ruger Americans instead. In .308.
If you took out ex army people and farmers that cull the 3006 would be the most popular by far , a range survey is always going to lean towards the 308 , a lot of ranges have a very tight calibre restriction which would never really show what people have or prefer to use , that’s for Vic anyway nsw and Queensland may have slightly smaller preferences as a lot mainly shoot pigs not deer, i love my 270wsm and 35sambar, as for the 223 it’s very popular but I wouldn’t rate it as a big game calibre , mine gets used a lot for culling and works fine for head shooting sure , but I never take it out for fun
