What would happen in a hung parliament?

Mike Smithson of Politicalbetting.com has asked, from a Lib Dem perspective, what would the Lib Dems do in a hung parliament?

I can only speak from a Labour perspective. My instinct is that if we were the largest party but had no majority, we would try to struggle on as a minority government, and dare the other parties to risk irritating the electorate by triggering a second election with a confidence vote.

If we are not the largest party it will be game over anyway.

I cannot visualise circumstances where Brown (or his sucessor?) would consider a coalition with the Lib Dems because to do so would cause so much anger in the PLP and wider party - one of the things that unites almost all Labour MPs and activists is hatred for the Lib Dems, largely brought on themselves by the opportunist way they campaign at a local level.

The tiny number of enthusiasts for Lib/Labery who advocated it in the run-up to 1997 may have had influence then but won't under the more tribal Brown - and after ten years of the Lib Dems undermining a Labour government.

I assume the Tories don't trust them any more than we do.

So really the question is not so much what would the Lib Dems do in a hung parliament? as "would the Lib Dems vote down a minority government formed by the largest party, or would they not risk a second election?"