It's taken nearly 50 years, but Australia's most populous state is vowing to make new homes a reality with a "faster and fairer" planning system that doesn't sweat "the small stuff".

Councils in NSW will get only 10 days to dispute small variations of development applications that normally take months to be processed, an alternative approval body panel will be made permanent and 16-year-old regional planning panels will be chucked on the scrap heap.

Premier Chris Minns is touting the ambitious overhaul as "the biggest reform" to planning and housing in the state's history.

"Young people are not finding a place to live in the second most expensive city (Sydney) on earth, and the primary reason for that is that we're not building enough houses," he told reporters on Wednesday.

"The plann

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