Contractors in London are being asked to stagger start times or get workers to use different forms of transport after ministers raised the alarm at pictures this week of overcrowding on Tube trains, warning that builders might be banned from parts of the network during the morning peak.

So worried is the Construction Leadership Council’s co-chair Andy Mitchell by the situation, that he has now written to firms asking them to rethink how they get workers to sites, particularly those travelling in from east London and beyond.