Sutton and Cheam MP Paul Scully expressed to parliament yesterday recommendations of how Southern Rail could be improved in the wake of the Gibb Report.

The report, an examination into the performance of the Southern Rail network, was published on June 22.

Members of Parliament held a debate in the House of Commons yesterday about how Southern’s railway services could be more efficient.

“One thing that I knew I was going to hate about being elected as an MP was the return to commuting, which I had not done for a little while,” Mr Scully told fellow MPs.

The conservative Sutton and Cheam MP then mentioned issues he believes are associated with the rail services in Sutton.

He said: “A lot of the problems start when Sutton services link at Selhurst. That is where we need investment. All the trains that go through Sutton at the moment are driver-only operated, and they all work reasonably well until they get to that point.”

Mr Scully suggested that the Mayor of London should “have a greater say in the management of suburban lines”.

He added: “Southern has been very abrasive in its approach to union matters, especially at the beginning. There are clearly too few carriages so we often have breakdowns, and there are too few drivers, hence the staff shortages, but we must come back to the unions.”

“Let us sort out this dispute and get a terrible service back to being just an incredibly poor service. From there, we can then make it to the next stage and get it to be a good service.”

Last week Sutton Guardian reported the 2018 improvements for Epsom, Sutton and Carshalton services that Govia Thameslink Railway are proposing.