ONE Nation MP Barnaby Joyce has described the Labor government’s decision to scrap the unfinished part of the Inland Rail Project as “beyond belief”.
The government says the project cost has ballooned to at least $45 billion, according to an “independent cost assessment”, the validity of which Joyce questions.
But this is the same government that has committed 47 billion dollars in renewable energy subsidies flowing largely to French multinationals, Canadian-Turkish joint ventures and Malaysian government-owned companies. It has also committed to a $128 billion dollar transmission network across farming country to link its wind and solar farms.
Joyce says freight rail “actually makes money” and the project was a key to the survival of regional towns and businesses along the route, which will now stop at Narromine – completely undermining the intent of the project to link the eastern states with a single transport corridor for mass movement of grain and other freight.
The Inland Rail would have also served as a back-up transport system for times such as the fuel crisis we recently experienced.
The same federal government has just spent 3.8 billion dollars on Melbourne’s Suburban Rail Loop, a project that Infrastructure Australia said has overstated benefits, that the Australian National Audit Office flagged concerns with, and that Victoria’s own Parliamentary Budget Office found would return between 60 and 70 cents for every dollar spent, delivering a net loss to taxpayers of between 7.4 billion and 10.6 billion dollars.
But Federal Labor, of course, must keep it’s city-based union buddies in jobs, and not those jobs in inconvenient locations like the Inland Rail route.
Major city news outlets reported incorrectly that the project would stop at Parkes, but freight trains have been running on the Parkes to Narromine section since 2020.
The project is supposed to run 1600km from Beveridge in Victoria to Brisbane. Narromine is 200km north of Parkes, that is 200km of completed operational railway that the city media apparently erased from existence because they did not know it was there.
The Narrabri to North Star section, just over 160km of upgraded track in north west NSW, has had grain trains running on it since November 2023.
However as of this week it is disconnected at both ends with no commercial purpose – a section of railway paid for by Australian taxpayers, built through farming country and welcomed by grain growers who have watched rail’s share of freight collapse from 28 percent in 1994 to just 2 percent today while highways crumble under the load.
The section of rail is now a stranded asset going nowhere. The 306km Narromine to Narrabri gap through the Pilliga country will remain unbuilt along with Queensland sections. “The Narrabri to North Star section sits in the middle of north west NSW like an expensive dead end,” a local resident posted on social media.
The resident also noted that properties along the abandoned corridor have been sitting under planning constraints for years.
“Landholders who were told their land was needed for a national freight railway have been unable to develop it, unable to sell it at full value, unable to make long-term investment decisions on their own farms while they waited for a project that has now been shelved.
“The government says works north of Parkes will focus on preservation of the rail corridor. In plain English that means the corridor stays tied up, the farmers stay in limbo and nobody in Canberra has to answer for it.
“NSW Farmers put it plainly this week. Real people and real businesses have already paid a price and the government owes them an honest answer about what happens to the easements already acquired and the assets that are now stranded.”
Project supporters also point out that an independent review of the Inland Rail found the completed project would have taken 200,000 truck journeys off Australian roads every single year. One single 1.8 kilometre Inland Rail freight train carries the equivalent of a staggering 110 B-double trucks.
“In 1994 rail carried 28 percent of freight on the Melbourne to Sydney corridor. By 2024 rail carried just 2 percent. The trucks that used to go by rail now go by road.
“The Newell Highway carries a large share of that freight and in the past two years alone there have been three fatal crashes involving trucks and semi-trailers on the Newell – in July 2024, September 2025 and January 2026. Five people died in those crashes.
“Every B-double that hammers the Newell Highway, the New England Highway and the Warrego Highway for the next decade because Inland Rail was not finished is a direct consequence of the decision made this week. Every pothole. Every accident. Every family that loses someone on a highway that did not need to be carrying that load.
The government that made this decision is not interested in that highway. It does not run through any seat they need to win.
So $30 billion was too much to connect the agricultural heartland of Australia to the national freight network while $47 billion is wasted on outrageously generous renewable energy subsidies and $128 billion is spent on connecting it all up.
The 30 billion dollar shortfall to finish Inland Rail is less than a quarter of the renewable energy subsidy commitment. It would have taken 200,000 trucks off Australian roads every single year. It would have connected the grain growing and cattle country of north west NSW and Queensland to ports more efficiently than at any time in history, saving diesel, road surfaces and lives.
“This is what city centric government looks like in practice. It is not a conspiracy. It is not malicious. It is simply a government that allocates resources based on where the votes are. The votes are in the cities. The freight highways are in the regions. The stranded railway is in the regions. The farmers in limbo are in the regions. The five people who died on the Newell Highway are from the regions.
The city media reported this as a cost blowout story and got the endpoint wrong by 200 kilometres. The regional press got it right because they actually know the country.
Australia called Inland Rail the backbone of a modern freight network for a modern nation. This week the government snapped that backbone at Narromine, not Parkes, and announced funding for a Melbourne suburban train in the same week. The city papers reported one and barely noticed the other.
If you want to know why regional Australia feels like it is being left behind, this week wrote the answer in black and white. The B-doubles will keep hammering the Newell. The stranded track between Narrabri and North Star will sit there going nowhere. The farmers along the abandoned corridor will keep waiting for an answer that is not coming. And the city will get its suburban loop.
That is Australian infrastructure policy in 2026. Urban votes. Regional roads. And a government that calls it sensible.
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