A plan which could have brought a long running dispute between Southern Railway and members of the RMT to an end has been revealed.

Today bosses at the train operator published a eight-point proposal which it made to the RMT at the conciliation service Acas last Friday which will retain the position of the conductor.

Crucially though, the offer stipulates that full control of closing the train's doors would move to the driver.

Members of the RMT are in the second of five days of industrial action over proposals by Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR), the parent company of Southern, to change the role of the conductor.

There is no Milton Keynes train to Clapham Junction, which runs through Watford Junction and Harrow.

The company wanted to scrap the role and bring in a new position of on-board supervisor.

The firm said there would be no redundancies or reduction of pay.

The RMT objected to the change as the new role would not be responsible for closing the doors of the train and its dispatch or be trained to the same safety-competent standards.

In the new offer the firm guarantee every train currently operated with a conductor will continue to be or second member of staff on board who will be trained to safety-competent standards including track safety training, evacuation, traction and full route knowledge (excluding train dispatch).

The RMT is holding a protest outside the Department for Transport tomorrow amid claims that the government has put a "blockade" on talks to end the dispute.

The union said it was "within an inch" of reaching an agreement during the Acas talks and repeated its claim that the Government had "sabotaged " any deal, again naming Transport Department official Peter Wilkinson as "directing operations from outside".

The Department denied the claims.

The union said a deal was being discussed based on an offer made last week by ScotRail in a similar dispute which led to strikes being suspended.

The rail firm said the key points of the offer are: • Guarantees that every train currently operated with a conductor will continue to have either a traditional conductor or a second member of staff on-board; Article continues after...

• Guarantees traditional conductors will retain their current competencies and second members of on-board will be trained to safety-competent standards including track safety training, evacuation, traction and full route knowledge (excluding train dispatch) which will pass to the driver; • Joint agreement by both Southern and RMT on the driver having full control of train dispatch and joint agreement by both parties to a proposed list of exceptional circumstances whereby a train can run without a second member of staff on-board; • Guarantees to retain the On-board Supervisor role (OBS) beyond 2021, should GTR retain the franchise and minimum levels of voluntary overtime for all OBS staff, details of which would be agreed with the RMT • A joint review in 12 months time of the new OBS role to include role development, training and career progression; • Collective bargaining rights for OBS staff.

The Campaign for Better Transport and a Southern passenger group, the Association of British Commuters, plan to march to the Department for Transport on Wednesday to call on the government to take urgent action to help resolve the Southern crisis.

The RMT is also calling for fresh talks.

Mick Cash has written to the company, saying: "The union believes that there is a deal to be done based around the ScotRail principles and that we need to pick up on the progress that was being made when the talks broke down on Friday.

"It is in no one's interests to prolong this dispute when the framework that can take us forward has been so clearly laid out."