THE NSW Coalition Government hasn't had one of its best years.
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After riding the crest of a popularity wave early in its re-elected term, Premier Mike Baird has absorbed a string of self-inflicted body blows which has put his government at risk of losing the next election.
Council mergers are never popular with the punters and the Coalition paid the ultimate price at the ballot box at a recent Orange by-election when the National Party lost a seemingly unloseable seat to a minor party.
Another big blip on the radar was the greyhound ban, ultimately overturned, but not before some damage was done.
Neither issue had major implications in our part of the world with the exception of the Corowa-Urana council merger which was considered far more palatable than the three-way union including Lockhart.
This week, one issue which has ticked off Albury residents is cuts to opening hours at the train station ticket office.
As part of a push to drive passengers to purchase tickets online and subsequently reduce staff, the office trading time was reduced to just two hours a day.
But then under mounting community anger came a concession with revised times of 9am-11am and 12.30pm-2.45pm from Monday.
Station staffing has gone from seven full-timers and one part-timer to two full-timers, two part-timers and area customer service manager.
Albury mayor Kevin Mack said the reduction in staff also heightened community safety concerns.
Member for Albury Greg Aplin is also frustrated with the situation and aired his concerns with rail authority, NSW TrainLink.
Border Rail Action Group went even further with its chief Bill Trail writing a strongly worded letter to NSW Transport Minister Andrew Constance about the situation he described as "nothing short of a debacle".
The most affected are the elderly and those without online access.
Some would argue they are in the minority, but governments have a responsibility to make decisions for all sectors of the community.
TrainLink has partly blamed the situation on delays on employing and training new staff.
The last thing the NSW Government needs is more disgruntled voters.