Gross plans to help prepare party for election next year

Following his resignation Prime Minister Stanislav Gross has said he aims to help his party prepare for the country's next national election in 2006. Although he has failed to elaborate on details, the Social Democrat chairman recently pledged at his party's convention that he would help his party earn over 30 percent of the vote in the next election, or stand down. A recent survey suggested that voter preference for the Social Democratic Party is currently far off that mark - less then half at 11.9 percent - the lowest number the party has seen since 1992.