Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce has strongly indicated no central Queensland graziers will be forced off their land for a military training facility, but has again stopped short of ruling it out completely.
Mr Joyce on Friday afternoon met with landholders around Shoalwater Bay over their fears they'll have their land compulsorily acquired.
The agriculture minister said it was a good meeting, and took locals' concerns on board.
"The prime minister said he doesn't believe in compulsory acquisition and neither do I, and if you take out that section of it then I think we're going to have a more congenial relationship because that means they'll only sell if they want to sell," Mr Joyce told 2GB.
Mr Joyce again stopped short of categorically ruling out compulsory acquisitions, saying he had to go back to Canberra to hash the matter out with Malcolm Turnbull and other officials.
Mr Turnbull was earlier Friday more equivocal, saying only that he'd asked Defence not to acquire any more land than required and to try to reach an agreement with affected landholders.
"So compulsory acquisitions are obviously a last resort," he told Radio 2SM in Sydney.
It came as the Queensland government called on Mr Joyce to end the uncertainty for graziers and rule out compulsory acquisitions altogether.
""There has been no consistent narrative from the start and now it seems the message is changing by the hour, depending on which senior member of the government is commenting," state Agriculture Minister Bill Byrne said in a statement
"But the landholders know what they have been told and that is that they may lose their properties against their will."
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