The Greens in England and Wales have more than 100,000 members for the first time, the party has announced, a near-50% rise since Zack Polanski took over as leader last month.

It puts them on a potential course to overtake the Conservatives and comes little more than a week after the Greens announced they had moved past the Liberal Democrats in membership numbers, getting to 83,500.

If the same momentum continues, party officials say, they could be on course to become bigger than the Conservatives. Tory party membership figures are not made public, but recent reports say the total is slightly above 120,000.