Support for Labour has halved since the election began, according to the first opinion poll of the weekend.

The poll of 1026 voters was taken on Monday and Tuesday - the day of, and the day after, a live TV debate between seven major leaders.

And the most significant finding is that Labour support has halved in two weeks - going from 8% in the last similar poll, to 4% today.

The Behaviour & Attitudes poll commissioned by the Sunday Times puts the junior coalition partner on just 4%.

The poll commissioned by The Sunday Times had been due to be published tomorrow, but it was leaked online in advance, and details have been published in full this morning by its sister paper, the Ireland edition of the Times.

Fine Gael rises two points to 30; Fianna Fáil enjoys the same increase, up 2 to 22. Sinn Fein however falls 2 points to 15%.

Unaligned independents are unchanged at 10%, while the independent alliance is at 5%, alongside the Anti Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit - which has polled higher than Labour for the first time.

The Greens, Renua and the Social Democrats are all on 3%, while the Workers Party is on 1%.

There is a 3% margin of error.