Bundestag President Wolfgang Schäuble | Pool photo by Michael Kappeler/AFP via Getty Images Schäuble: German government could survive without SPD Bundestag president says a minority government would be stable.

Germany’s government will remain stable even if its center-left junior partner leaves, Bundestag President Wolfgang Schäuble told Bild am Sonntag.

The senior conservative politician and former finance minister said he hopes Germany’s grand coalition between the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Social Democratic Party (SPD) will remain in place until the end of the legislative term, but said a breakdown in the alliance would not threaten stability.

“We would get a stable government with a minority government,” the Bundestag president said in an interview published Sunday.

“The fathers and mothers of the Basic Law [Germany's constitution] have made the chancellor's position so strong from the experience of the failure of the Weimar Republic that we should not be afraid of it,” he added.

“If the SPD can not [make it any more] at some point, it's not the end of the world. We have stable democratic conditions,” he said.

Schäuble acknowledged the possibility of a minority government in 2017 during the country's difficult coalition negotiations but said it is not the preferred option.

Germany’s ruling parties have since been suffering in popularity, with the far-right Alternative for Germany gaining ground at their expense. Schäuble has however rejected any potential alliance between the CDU and the far-right party.

The CDU has slid in the polls amid the waning popularity of Chancellor Angela Merkel and public squabbling with its sister party, the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU).

Nationwide popularity for the CDU and CSU stands at 27 percent, according to a new poll published this weekend by Bild am Sonntag. The SPD stands at 17 percent and the Greens and Alternative for Germany both at 16 percent.

The CSU is expected to lose its majority in Bavaria’s parliament in the October 14 election, while the CDU is also expected to perform poorly in an upcoming election in Hesse.

“I know that through our dispute we have contributed to making the polls look as they do,” Merkel said Saturday in a speech to the CDU/CSU youth wing in the city of Kiel, in which she called on the conservative partners to end their squabbling.

“Voters don’t appreciate it if we argue and they don’t even understand what we’re arguing about,” Merkel said.