The Australian Industry Group wants to increase the immigration intake cap by 30,000 people in the next financial year, saying the country needs more skilled workers.

The Ai Group wants the Government to take in 220,000 people in the 2014-2015 financial year; up from 190,000 at the moment.

The business lobby group says the aging workforce in logistics and resources must be filled by migrant workers, and the skills shortages in construction, engineering, health and mining need addressing too.

The call has already caught the ire of a huge amount of workers in those fields. Many say their sectors cannot support current levels, let alone a rapid influx of new workers.

Ai Group's chief executive Innes Willox has suggested ramping-up the intake to ensure projects and productivity targets are met.

Some respondents say the suggestion shows the business group is out of touch with reality.

“The Australian Workplace Productivity Agency has identified that Australia will need an increase of about 2.8 million people with quite specific skills over the next decade to fill some of those gaps,” Willox said.

“We need to find ways to fill those gaps, and obviously we can train our own, but the quickest stop gap measure is to import skills.”

With Australia’s unemployment rate currently just under 6 per cent and some institutions tipping that figure to rise soon, the call has come at a confusing time for many.

The Ai Group says the 220,000 figure would only stand for a few years before it might need to be increased again.

The lobbyists have singled-out residential construction as a key field requiring an injection of workers.

Mr Willox says the state of Australian training may have something to do with the lack of skilled workers.

“Employers are increasingly concerned about the skill levels of graduates both from universities and schools, and this is something that we need to address,” he said.

“We've seen Australia slipping down the tables when it comes to those basic skills around our science, technology, engineering, mathematics skills.”