Little hope changes to immigration rules will ease pressure in the building sector

The Government is simplifying immigration settings to speed up the application process in a bid to ease labour shortages.

There's also a new "Green List" of critical workers -- which offers a prioritised pathway to residency in a bid to attract talent.

But builders aren't included.

Construction Strategy Group executive director Julien Leys says they need anyone they can get.

He says that includes not only highly skilled workers but people who can come onto a building site and take on any role - including carpenters, chippies and the like.