President Georgi Purvanov will organise a round-table discussion on the subject of changes to Bulgaria's electoral system on July 7 2008, a statement on the presidency website said.

The discussion will be held in Sofia' National Palace of Culture (NDK) hall 6, starting with 10.30am and it will seek “ideas for changes to the electoral system and consensus on legislative changes”, the statement said.

Members of Parliament, political party members representative of the executive and of the local branches of power are among the invited.

The event will be just the latest of many initiatives of Paurvanov on the subject of reforming the way Bulgaria's holds its elections.

On June 30 Purvanov said he would ask Parliament to call a referendum on changing the electoral system if political parties fail to hear his demands. Purvanov wants Parliament to amend the electoral system by introducing a stronger element of majoritarian elections within a mixed electoral system and changes in the political parties' financing.

Among Purvanov's ideas feature proposals for introducing strict criteria for parties that would be allowed to take part in elections. That would include having branches in at least two thirds of all Bulgarian municipalities, and election results of at least one per cent from the previous two consecutive elections.

If parties fail to achieve this threshold, they would be erased from the party register and will have to register again, Purvanov said.

Other ideas included setting up if a public register for parties' financing with only individuals allowed to donate funds to parties. As a compensation, Purvanov wants the state subsidy for parties that have won seats in Parliament to be raised.

Purvanov first talked about his ideas after the local elections in October 2007, which saw reports about numerous cases of vote-buying. Since then, he has been repeating his ideas in various meetings and events.

In early June, he received the formal support of Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev for the changes to happen this fall, less than a year before the next general elections for Parliament.