Southern Rail passengers will face further travel misery after the train drivers’ union ASLEF overwhelmingly voted in favour of an overtime ban.

The union will not work extended hours for the beleaguered franchise after 95 per cent of its balloted members voted for action short of a strike.

It also agreed to in favour of a walkout after 87 per cent of polled staff agreed to take industrial action.

Following the vote union bosses announced the ban will start on Sunday, June 4.

Mick Whelan, ASLEF general secretary, said: “We have been talking to Southern to try and resolve the outstanding issues in a way which works for drivers, passengers, and the company.

“Unfortunately, the company has refused to move its position so we have, reluctantly, informed them that our members will refuse to work overtime from the end of this month.”

Responding to the outcome Nick Brown, chief operating officer at Southern’s parent company Govia Thameslink said he was ‘dismayed’ by the union’s decision.

He added: “After over five months of intense negotiations and two peace deals agreed and recommended by the ASLEF executive, we are dismayed the union leadership is taking this action, which is designed to impact as many of our passengers as possible.

“Driver-controlled operation with on-board supervisors was fully implemented back in January and thanks to this we are running more trains than before and our service has improved for five consecutive months. We’re safely running over 80,000 trains a month with drivers controlling the doors across our network. We’re sorry that passengers will suffer because of this unnecessary action.

“We have worked our hardest to resolve this dispute with ASLEF. If this action does go ahead we will run as full a timetable as possible. We will be working around the clock to evaluate the impact and develop contingency plans which will be advertised as soon as possible.”