Whatever your opinion of the David Cameron photo-opportunity of him driving a dog-sleigh to view melting glaciers on the remote island of Svalbard, one thing is certain, he is trying to associate his party with concern for the environmental cost of individual and corporate behaviour.

This intention, combined with particular policy statements, for instance about child poverty, reduced emphasis on lowering taxation and so on, reflects his wish to re-position the Conservative Party such that Mrs Thatcher's statement that "there is no such thing as society" is seen as being very firmly in the past.

Perhaps Cameron has been inspired by the influential works of the economist JK (John Kenneth) Galbraith, who died on April 29 at the age of 97.

Galbraith (born a Canadian but who became a US citizen in 1937) advised Democratic presidents from Franklin Roosevelt to Bill Clinton.

His ideas lost favour at the time of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, but I would strongly recommend anyone to read his main works.

His most famous book, called The Affluent Society, was published in 1958.

At a time when it was not at all fashionable, he pointed out the paradox of private affluence coexisting with public squalor and, in so doing, raised significant questions about the most appropriate balance between public and private sectors, between public and private spending and levels of taxation, between individual and corporate freedoms and responsibilities.

Nearly 40 years after its publication, I think the notion of "private affluence and public squalor" has never been more relevant, here and internationally.

The theme was taken forward in his book The Culture of Contentment, published in 1992, in which he considered what he believed to be the short-sighted selfishness of the contented majority and the ever-increasing deprivation of the minority.

Galbraith is also associated with the phrase "conventional wisdom", meaning the dominant ideas at any one time, a "wisdom" he would encourage everyone to challenge.

In emphasising the environment and in shifting his party's thinking on some key economic issues, in recognising the importance of "public" and not merely "private" considerations in determining policy, David Cameron appears to be willing also to challenge the "conventional wisdom", not least that within his own party.

As he surveys the landscape after the local elections, maybe this is something Blair too needs to challenge.