This morning at 11am Alliance MP Frank Grover joined the growing ranks of MPs who have defected their party to join another.

Mr Grover held a press conference with Christian Heritage Party leader Graham Capill and announced he will be standing as a Christian Heritage candidate in the upcoming election.

With Manu Alamein Kopu, and the two breakaway Green Party MPs - Rod Donald and Jeanette Fitzsimmons, who remain Alliance MPs till the election - Grover brings the number of Alliance Party defectors to four.

Mr Capill told scoop this afternoon that it "felt good to be back in the arena" with an MP in Parliament.

Mr Capill said the announcement signalled the beginning of the campaign for his party.

The Christian Heritage party had already selected candidates for 85% of electorates and Mr Capill said he believed the party was ahead in polling terms of where it had been leading up to the 1996 election.

Shortly before the 1996 election National MP Graeme Lee resigned to form the Christian Democrats and with Christian Heritage the Chriistian Coalition polled an impressive 4.5% of the party vote.

The party fell just 12,000 votes short of the 5% threshold which would have brought it six seats in Parliament,

© Scoop Media

Alastair Thompson

Scoop Publisher

Alastair Thompson is the co-founder of Scoop. He is of Scottish and Irish extraction and from Wellington, New Zealand. Alastair has 24 years experience in the media, at the Dominion, National Business Review, North & South magazine, Straight Furrow newspaper and online since 1997. He is the winner of several journalism awards for business and investigative work.

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