Garth Hamilton demands full Toowoomba rail report be released

A $15m rail report has sparked a transparency battle after Groom MP Garth Hamilton accused the government of releasing only cherry-picked findings to avoid scrutiny.

A $15 million rail report has sparked a transparency battle after Toowoomba's MP accused the government of releasing only cherry-picked findings to avoid scrutiny.

Toowoomba’s federal MP Garth Hamilton has called for the release of the full business report for the passenger rail to Brisbane, blaming a lack of government transparency for delays in the project.

The Toowoomba and Lockyer Valley councils are supporting a new intermodal public transport plan that would see the current Brisbane to Rosewood line extended to Withcott where a bus line would connect to Toowoomba.

The new proposal being dubbed The Range by Toowoomba mayor Geoff McDonald would be modelled off the Sunshine Coast’s legacy project The Wave, and would be a simple solution that doesn’t require tunneling or waiting for the National Inland Rail project.

The proposed Range project was discussed in a rail summit hosted by the Toowoomba Council and News Corp on November 20, with backing from Toowoomba and Lockyer Valley leaders who deem it as a plausible solution by the 2032 Olympics.

This proposal was not explored as part of the passenger rail business case commissioned by the previous state government in 2019, and Mr Hamilton has called for the previous government to release the entire report.

In a statement to Mr Hamilton on November 28, Australian Infrastructure and Transport Minister Catherine King said the T2B strategic business case was closed under the existing Project Proposal Report and accessible to the public.

Groom MP Garth Hamilton speaks at the Toowoomba Rail Summit on November 20, 2025.

Mr Hamilton said the information was only a fraction of the full report.

“This is a ten-page snapshot, not the full strategic business case,” he said.

“We need the full report, not just the cherry-picked summary.

“Groom taxpayers funded this business case, and they deserve to see the complete findings.”

He said the community could not make an informed decision without accessing the full report, something their team has been pushing for since February.

In February, Senator Matthew Canavan posed questions about the business case and heard that of the $15m allocated to the case only $2.5m had been spent.

Mr Canavan said there was a lack of transparency on the issue.

“The problem is that you avoid parliamentary scrutiny through this process as well Chair, I think it’s something we should come back to,” he said.

“This is not the first time this has happened. Particularly when federal taxpayer money is going to fund something, it should be available to federal parliamentary committees.”

The remaining funds were returned to the Infrastructure Investment Program (IOP).

Mr Hamilton claimed that without the release of the full report the project would still be a long way off.

“As Senator Canavan pointed out, this arrangement meant a taxpayer-funded report was able to avoid parliamentary scrutiny entirely,” he said.

“That lack of transparency has stalled progress for years, and it’s exactly why the full report must now be released so we can finally move this project forward.”

According to a Department of Transport and Main Roads spokesperson, releasing the full report could be a breach of privacy laws.

“Typically, governments do not release full versions of business cases which include information that is commercial-in-confidence and has sensitive details of properties that may or may not be impacted by the various options under consideration,” the spokesperson said.

“Releasing this information may affect a government’s ability to achieve value for money during the delivery phase of a project.

“A summary document released publicly provided an overview of the business case findings, which outlined that any forward planning for passenger rail between Brisbane and Toowoomba would be contingent on the delivery of the Federal Government’s Inland Rail project.”