Green support: More than one-quarter of voters would back party - if they thought it had chance of success

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More than one-quarter of voters could support the Greens if they thought the party had a chance of victory, a poll has suggested.

The YouGov survey found the party outpolled Ukip when people were asked how they would vote if it could win in their constituency.

Thirty-five per cent said they would be “likely” to vote Tory with the same number opting for Labour.

The Greens were named by 26 per cent, ahead of Ukip on 24 per cent, with the Liberal Democrats on 16 per cent.

The reservoir of potential support for the Greens revealed by the survey for the Times's Red Box underlines their appeal to left-leaning voters and their potential impact on close-run constituency results in next year’s election.

The Greens only won one per cent of the vote at the last election, although they captured their first parliamentary seat when Caroline Lucas was elected in Brighton Pavilion.

Since then their support has been steadily creeping up in the polls reaching as high as eight per cent and they outpolled the Lib Dems in this year’s European Parliament elections.