However the Queensland Transport Department has on Friday asked for a staffing audit on the company which won the New Generation Rolling Stock project.

The Bombardier Consortium won the contract from the previous state government in January 2014.

Concerns about skilled professional Australians finding it hard to get work on the project were published by Fairfax Media this week.

The last staff audit was completed in June 2014, however Fairfax Media has been unable to see the results.

Former Transport Minister Scott Emerson said no concerns were raised with him about locals missing out on jobs in the train design phase, a spokeswoman said on Friday.

The Gold Coast Light Rail project trains were built by Bombardier in Germany.

The new Brisbane trains will be built in India and maintained a new facility, now being built at Wulkuraka.

In 2014 Mr Emerson said the complex infrastructure agreement would save $11 million per train, paying around $13.7 million per "six car set", half the price paid by the previous government.

On Thursday Fairfax Media reported concerns by two Australian train design specialists who work in three-dimensional modelling that they found it impossible to get work on the project.

Fairfax has since been contacted by two other former employees telling a similar story.

Professional engineering associations have also raised concerns.

All former staff said a lot of the train design was being done by Indian staff from India requiring training on the design software. An Australian draftsman said he was approached and rejected five times by a recruitment firm during the design phase.

Bombardier said they received 300 applications for the draftsmen's positions over the past 14 months.

One former employee estimated that 75 per cent of the people who had been hired by the project in the 12 months he worked there were from India.

These figures were rejected by the Bombardier Consortium.

The New Generation Rollingstock Project will build 75, six car train "sets" in India and install them in Queensland from mid-2016 until 2018.

What does Bombardier say?

The Bombardier Consortium will construct the trains in India at Bombardier's train manufacturing plant at Sivla after they are designed in Milton.

On Thursday night the company released a statement rejecting the allegations of favouring Indian employees.

"Over the life of the New Generation Rollingstock (NGR) project to date, Bombardier has employed 76 draftspeople, of these only 11 are employed from Bombardier India," the statement says.

"Currently, Bombardier is employing 46 local draftspeople, and only three are from Bombardier in India. None of the local candidates are on visas."

There are no details of other staff in the design phase of the project.

One former employee said Indian staff were receiving localised training on Bombardier's three dimensional engineering software and were then appointed to the design team at Milton.

The Bombardier statement says these descriptions "inaccurately represented" the situation, according Bombardier's Business Development manager Michael Clark.

"Through a competitive tendering process which included value and local content evaluation criteria, Bombardier were successful on the basis that Bombardier Transportation Australia would utilise its Indian manufacturing capabilities to ensure that the new commuter trains are delivered on time and people of Queensland can ride on faster, safer and comfortable commuter trains from 2016 onwards," the statement reads.

Bombardier says contract allows integration between India and Australian workforces

"A fundamental success factor for the project is the cross water team integration between engineering (undertaken fully in Milton) and manufacturing teams (in India)," Bombardier said.

The extent of the "crosswater team integration" between the Bombardier Australia operations and the Bombardier India operations is not explained.

Mr Clark said there were over 300 applicants for the local drafting positions over the past 18 months, but did not say how many drafting positions were part of the design team, nor the make-up of the design team at their headquarters in Milton, which is now believed to include over 200 staff.

What is underway now?

A spokeswoman for Transport Minister Jackie Trad said the complaints were being investigated.

"The Local Industry Participation Plan is reviewed and audited on an annual basis with a report provided to Government," the spokeswoman said.

"The last report was conducted in June 2014.

"The Queensland Government has asked for an updated audit report in light of yesterday's reports."

What does the engineering industry say?

Australia's senior engineering lobby group, Professionals Australia, has asked the Queensland Government to investigate after being told of similar experiences by engineers who worked on the project.

Professionals Australia represents registered engineers and draftspersons working in Australia.

Chief executive officer Chris Walton said the Queensland Government should investigate the allegations that positions are not being appointed on merit.

"Professionals Australia has two key questions for Bombardier – the first, why is the company choosing to employ overseas engineers when there is a surplus of world-class, highly-skilled and experienced professional engineers in Australia looking for employment?" Mr Walton said.

"The second question is whether or not Bombardier is meeting the legal requirements of the Queensland Government, which legislated that all engineering services undertaken in Queensland must be done by a Registered Professional Engineer of Queensland (RPEQ), or under the direct supervision of an RPEQ."

Bombardier did not reply to this exact engineering question in their statement.

Mr Walton said this issue should be addressed and the Queensland Government should be satisfied the project's technical engineering requirements are being met.

"There appear to be only seven persons with active registration currently working at Bombardier."

"Seven people to sign-off of the collective engineering services of a $4.4 billion project and to supervise all Bombardier engineers working in the State does not seem adequate."

The Queensland Major Contractors Association reported in March 2015 reported a major wind-back in engineering and infrastructure projects with 5400 jobs being lost.

Bombardier's view on local employment

Bombardier said their production team met all the requirements of local production asked of the $4.4 billion project.

"Bombardier and our consortium partners have developed a comprehensive Local Industry Participation Plan (LIPP) to deliver the NGR project which is audited each year by the State Government to ensure the project achieves the highest level of local engagement," the statement reads.

However their Local Industry Participation Plan seems to refer to $50 million in future operations at the maintenance plant, not in the design phase of the project.

What is the union position?

The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) called on Bombardier to make sure it employed as many Australians as possible in all stages of the project.

AMWU Queensland and Northern Territory Secretary Rohan Webb said it was a time for a new local procurement policy to be developed.

"Queensland unemployment is at its highest in almost 12 years and companies like Bombardier need to acknowledge that and play a role in the solution," he said.

"We need stronger and more rigorously enforced local procurement and employment legislation to put this issue to bed once and for all."