3GS home button not working

So I've seen all over the internet that there has been issues with the home button on a variety of iPhone models but none of the suggestions help me (bar replacing the Charge Port Dock Connector, I would like to use this as a last resort).

I regularly upgrade with each software release, apparently some home button issues were related to that but as I didn't think there would be any correlation between the two I'm not sure when it began to happen.

It started off slowly about 6 months to a year ago with the home button needing more than one click to register and the other day I woke up to it dead.

I've tried various suggestions as I said before such as opening up the phone, checking the connectors for dust and dirt (I keept it in top condition so there was no dust), I tried a suggestion of grounding the connectors to see if there was a home button response but there was nothing.

After several complete restores I'm still having the issue. I can't seem to restore back to the factory settings(version 1 or whatever it was), it keeps restoring back to the latest firmware (v5.1)so it could still be a software issue.

However I have noticed that in order to put the phone into the recovery mode (I forget the name, but you hold the on/off and home button for 10 seconds to get up the apple logo.. A hard reset maybe?) but I do that and it works.. Strange, since I thought the home button didn't work? So I guess that's a positive to know it may not be a hardware issue?

Also I should mention whenever turning the phone off and on again voice control decides to start up on its own and make random calls as a lot of people have said in my situation..

Thanks in advance for any assistance as without a home button it's difficult to say the least!

open up the weather,stocks or other stock app on the phone, then hold the lock button until you get the slide to unlock, then hold the home button until it forces the app to close and you are taken to the home screen. that re calibrates the home button, if that doesnt work then your only option is to get a new home button.
Here are a few options for you.
Amazon.com: Full LCD Screen Display + Touch Screen Digitizer Assembled Together for Apple Iphone 3GS 3 GS ~ Repair Parts Replacement: Electronics
Amazon.com: Original Apple iphone 3GS home button key + Flex Cable: MP3 Players & Accessories

Thanks for the tip, although my situation has gotten worse.

I was unable to try your suggestion. Since I never had a reply for a few days the phone ran out of battery. I left it to charge for a couple of hours but after having it on charge for only a few minutes it poped up with the 'plug into iTunes' picture. As I was going out I left it thinking it would charge while I was away and that I would plug it into iTunes when I got home. Once I got home the iTunes picture was still showing so I plugged it in to iTunes which told me that it detected a phone in recovery mode and that I should restore it. After the restore however it complained of low battery so I kept it charging off my computer for a while until.. The iTunes logo appeared again.

This went round about 3-4 times before I gave up.

I heard jailbreaking the phone would help me if the home button wasn't working so that was my next step but I couldn't get the phone to enter DFU mode from its recovery mode (Obviously because the Home button isn't working). I managed to find a way around it, got it into DFU mode and used Redsn0w. However Redsn0w froze half way through and has left my iphone completely dead..

After looking around it's possible after a few days that the phone will wake up from this state but I'm doubtful. Looks like I'll be saving up for a new phone.. If only there was a way to get back all the data. I've still got backups but I'm guessing you can't transfer them between phones. **** Apple and their lack of memory card support..