Imagine the irony of a situation where you cannot make it to a Southern Railway event due to their own trains being delayed.

MP Paul Scully found himself in that exact situation on Wednesday while trying to get to Victoria for Southern Railway's ‘meet the manager event’.

The Sutton and Cheam MP tweeted his dilemma from Carshalton Beeches station.

Instead of being able to catch a train directly to Victoria station Mr Scully ended up going to London Bridge where he caught the Jubilee line to Victoria, arriving 10 minutes late for the meeting.

He said: “I’m lucky that I had that option really or I would have been totally stuffed.

“I still can’t see anything that Southern are doing that is going to improve the service here in Sutton.

“The fact that I can remember the trains that are on time rather than the trains that are late says something.

“There is no point in the timetable, it varies day to day.

“If I am late for the meeting that is one thing but if I miss a vote it could have a huge influence on what is going on.”

A Southern spokesman said: “A problem with the signalling system at Clapham Junction and a passenger falling ill on one of our trains at West Croydon meant that our service was subject to delays throughout the morning peak.

“As a result, we had to make some alterations to some train services to maximise service recovery and to lower the risk of further knock-on delays to other services.

“Although both these incidents were not within our control, providing a punctual service is a top priority for us and we continue to work closely with Network Rail on this.”

Last month Mr Scully had a meeting with Southern to pose questions about the quality of service provided by the company.

He is yet to receive a response.