Labour’s average opinion poll lead over the Conservatives has grown from eight percentage points to 33 in the four weeks since Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget.

On September 23, the day the former chancellor made his financial statement in the House of Commons, Labour’s seven-day average poll share stood at 41% while the Tories were on 33%.

Since then, Labour’s lead has grown steadily, reaching 18 percentage points by September 30, 25 points by October 7 and 29 points a week ago on October 14.

Labour’s poll average as of October 21 is 54%, with the Conservatives on 21%, the Liberal Democrats on 10% and the Greens on 4%.

The party has been ahead of the Conservatives in the polls since December last year, around the time stories first began to emerge of Downing Street parties during Covid-19 lockdowns.

But until last month Labour’s lead was usually in single digits.

Double-digit leads started to become more common in early September, soon after Liz Truss became prime minister.

In the last four weeks the lead has first doubled and then trebled in size.

While most polling companies in the past week have shown Labour’s lead to be in the high 20s or low 30s, two have put it even higher, at 36 points (Redfield & Wilton) and 39 points (People Polling).

The figures from People Polling also put the Conservatives on 14%, only three points ahead of the Liberal Democrats on 11% and the lowest poll score for the Tories for at least 50 years.

These are the sorts of figures that would likely see a landslide Labour victory at a general election – were one to take place tomorrow, and were people to vote in the same way across the country.

Before this year, the last time the party enjoyed regular poll leads of 20 or 30 points was in the months directly after the general election of 1997, when Labour won a 179-seat majority.

Opinion polls are snapshots of the prevailing public mood, not projections or forecasts.

With the next general election still more than two years away – the latest possible date is January 23 2025 – there is plenty of time for the national numbers to change.

But polls both shape and reflect the prevailing mood of the country, in turn affecting morale among politicians and party members alike.