John Mant is a councillor on the City of Sydney who is not standing at next week's election. Mant was elected on Clover Moore's ticket in 2012. But his involvement in local government and planning pre-dates even Sydney's long-serving lord mayor. Mant worked with Whitlam minister Tom Uren on urban policy in the 1970s. When the then Coalition government wanted to re-write laws regarding councils in the early 1990s, Mant had a major role in drawing up the Local Government Act (1993).

In standing down from the City of Sydney, Mant wants to emphasise an opportunity that confronts the NSW government. Mant does not think the government will grasp that opportunity. But he thinks it should. He thinks it should to save us all time and money. And he thinks it should to enhance the feel and function and – to employ a word burdened by overuse - the liveability of our neighbourhoods.

City of Sydney councillor John Mant says planning systems need to be simplified. Credit:Sahlan Hayes

The issue, as it often is, is the planning system. Planning issues are at once insufferably complex, deeply boring, and yet, from the right angle, strikingly vital and interesting. Planning laws and controls help explain why, on a winter's day, a stream of sunshine can dissect the towers of central Sydney to strike you on the back. They help explain the success or failure of a local coffee cart. They help explain why Harry Triguboff is Australia's richest man. They explain why many of the nicest apartments in Sydney don't have balconies, yet why almost all new apartments do have balconies, and why that may be a good thing.

The opportunity, says Mant, comes in the form of Rob Stokes, the Planning Minister. Stokes, with a doctorate on the topic, is the most knowledgeable planning minister the state is likely to have, according to Mant. Stokes gets the problem. The problem is the planning law.