The Green party is holding its largest-ever conference, while its leader runs as a candidate in the Holborn and St Pancras byelection

Zack Polanski also insisted his authority as leader of the Green party of England and Wales does not depend on winning next week’s Holborn and St Pancras byelection, amid suggestions that the party’s popularity has peaked.

Polanski, who is trying to take Keir Starmer’s former seat from Labour, described the contest as “probably 50/50 right now” and “really on a knife edge”.

This will be our biggest and most exciting Green party conference ever, coming on the back of a year of unprecedented membership growth and extraordinary electoral success.

Greens have turned hope into electoral wins – in councils, boroughs, in mayoral elections and with our exciting breakthrough in Gorton and Denton.