German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier arrives for a news conference of German Chancellor Angela Merkel following the Hesse state election in Berlin, Germany, October 29, 2018. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

BERLIN (Reuters) - German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier told a newspaper that the national ruling alliance would stick together despite Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats and their Social Democrat (SPD) coalition partner suffering losses in a regional poll.

“The grand coalition will hold together because the SPD, CDU and CSU would otherwise lose a huge amount of voters’ trust,” Altmaier, a member of Merkel’s CDU, was cited as saying by Handelsblatt.

The CSU is the Bavarian sister party to Merkel’s CDU and is part of the federal coalition along with the CDU and SPD.