And this is where I see a flaw in both FPTP and STV. Since they're based on the candidate and not the party, the result is that if you vote for a candidate based on his party affiliation, and after he gets into Parliament he leaves the party, your vote is lost (it has happened on occiasion after all). That's where MMP or pure RP could be more beneficial to voters like yourself.That's why I was thinking in the original post in this thread of actually giving each voter the choice of voting either for a candidate or pure RP, with the list of all registered parties at that level of government (be it provincial or federal) appearing on one side of the ballot with no candidate's name appearing (besides, it would include all  parties, not just those represented in that riding), and the names of all the local candidates on the other but without party affiliation mentioned.

This way, those who vote for parties can in fact vote for a party system whereby if a candidate elected based on party votes should leave his party, those votes can be withdrawn from him, forcing a loval bi-election.

 Yet for those who vote for the candidate, any vote received by that candidate belongs to him and cannot be withdrawn even if he should leave his party. The fact that candidates and parties would be kept separate on the ballot would eliminate any possible confusion, with the voter knowing full well whether he's voting for the candidate or the party.

In the end, candidate votes woudl go to the candidate in a traditional FPTP fashion, but party votes would go to individual parties, which the party would be free to give to whatever candidate it wants, likely done strategically to maximize the number of seats for its party in Parliament. This way, a candidate would have a better sense of whether he ought to vote on his own conscience or on that of the party, depending on the sourse of the majority of votes that get him into power.

This would seem to me to be the most fair system to both sides, essentially a combination of both extremes, giving each voter the freedom to choose whether to vote for party or candidate.

Granted, the idea in the OP is still quite crude and would need alot of polishing up to figure out more exactly how the parties would give out the votes to their candidates.

On the other hand, if the PR crowd can accept STV, then essentially the problem is solved.