Barnaby Blasts Government For Harming His Own Property Prices With Inland Rail Cancellation

ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact

Former Deputy Prime Minister and rock farmer Barnaby Joyce has this week launched a blistering attack on the Albanese Government’s decision to cancel the Inland Rail project north of Narromine, describing the move as economically illiterate and strategically indefensible.

It is a position that sources close to the Member for New England insist has nothing to do with the 2,400-acre parcel of goat country outside Gwabegar that Joyce and has attempting to sell since approximately 2014.

"The minister for infrastructure has become the minister for excuses," Joyce said.

"He's fucked me. This country is worthless, there's not even a fucken pub at Gwabegar anymore. It's between Poor Man's Purlewaugh (Baradine) and fucking Pilliga! Pilliga! Albo's fucked me. I'm going to lose money on this now."

Joyce purchased the two Gwabegar blocks between 2006 and 2008 for a combined $572,000, describing the ag-preneurial venture at various points as a wheat-farming experiment, a lifestyle purchase and an effort to square off the block. Local farmers, who refer to the surrounding country as "truly shit," have noted it could not support enough livestock to cover council rates, let alone a crop of any description.

What the land does sit on is a Santos petroleum exploration licence. It also sits within fifteen kilometres of the Inland Rail corridor, a route that in a 2010 alignment study passed directly through Gwabegar before being redirected. Joyce was Water and Agriculture Minister when cabinet signed off on the final route in 2016 and did not declare the land holding during those deliberations.

His office clarified that a train travelling fifteen kilometres from a property before stopping a further hundred kilometres away cannot possibly or reasonably constitute a conflict of interest, which was a relief to many of his concerned constituents.

Joyce has also faced questions over his 2017 decision as Water Minister to sign off on an $80 million taxpayer buyback of water licences from a company co-founded by then-Energy Minister Angus Taylor. The deal returned a $52 million profit, much of it flowing to a Cayman Islands entity. Joyce said he had played no part in negotiations. It was later established he had approved the closed tender process, set conditions on departmental work, and personally signed off on the figure.

There was also the matter of a government-funded mobile tower in his New England electorate that ended up on Gina Rinehart’s property at Kingstown. Installed on low ground in a bit of a hollow, locals described the coverage is still worse than a fat man trying to put sunscreen on his own back. Joyce said the siting was entirely a matter for Telstra and not his problem.

Joyce has also been a vocal opponent of the New England Renewable Energy Zone transmission line, organising farmers, hobby farmers and anti-renewables groups against the project and describing himself as a fighter for landowners in the hills at Danglemah, where his family’s country sits. EnergyCo subsequently made a drastic change to the transmission corridor in October 2025, cutting 98 properties from the study area and steering the route away from the Joyce family farm. EnergyCo said the new alignment was safer, more efficient and reflected Barnaby's feedback. Critics noted it also created a whole new set of affected landowners in the Walcha and Upper Hunter areas, who woke to find the line had been shifted onto their country without warning or consultation. Joyce promptly showed up to support them too and get his picture taken.

More to come.