Self-absorption wins the day: Our private greed drives out the social good

As long as Australians are preoccupied with house prices, credit card debts, interest rates, tax cuts and getting ahead - in other words, as long as they define their success in life by money - Labor will never win, except by mimicking the Liberal Party.

But there is cause for hope. Not far beneath the surface most Australians have a gnawing doubt about the value of a money-driven life. The Newspoll survey also found that 83 per cent of Australians believe that our society is "too materialistic - that is too much emphasis on money and not enough on the things that really matter".

For they suspect that the money society is at the root of the decline in values - the disposable relationships, instant gratification, moral laxity, selfishness, corporate greed and the loss of civic culture.

It is in showing the link between the money society and the decline in values, and then painting a picture of a new society that is less selfish and materialistic and more devoted to the "things that really matter", that a new politics can be forged.