Children’s classic Thomas the Tank Engine has been blamed for a lack of female train drivers due to its absence of positive female characters, Labour's shadow transport secretary, Mary Creagh, has said.

Creagh said that the much-loved children’s series from the 1940‘s, which tells of the adventures of a steam train named Thomas and his friends, set a bad example to children and described the lack of female train drivers as ‘a national scandal’.

Of the female characters that did appear within the stories, Creagh said that they were “annoyance, a nuisance and in some cases a danger.”

ASLEF, the train driver’s union is currently working on recruiting more female drivers.

According to the Daily Mail, Hit Entertainment, the company which now own's the rights to Thomas the Tank Engine, plans to introduce new female characters into the series.

Creagh also advised that recruitment adverts be placed in female focused publications, such as Women’s Own and Good Housekeeping, in order to reach their target demographic.