The Department for Transport (DfT) will invest £20 million in a bid to rapidly improve running of the southern rail network.

Chris Gibb, non-executive director at Network Rail, has also been appointed to head up a new project board which will explore how the money should be spent, with plans due to be presented in the autumn.

So far, £2 million will be spent on more rapid response teams to fix faults quicker, with £2.5 million going on speeding up train maintenance.

A further £800,000 will be poured into extra signal supervisors while £900,000 will pay for measures to limit the impact of bridge strikes.

The board will feature a passenger representative to ensure that commuters’ views are heard and improvements meet passenger demands.

DfT acknowledges that disruption to the southern rail network in recent months has been ‘unacceptable’, with issues caused by ongoing industrial action by the RMT and guards going off sick.

Transport secretary Chris Grayling hopes that the board’s review will suggest how the network can work better for the public.

“We also need to get to grips with things that go wrong on this part of the network [and] to tackle the cause of breakdowns that too often cause frustrating and damaging delays,” he said.