Isabel Hardman

Presumably as a way of getting out of an endless debate about receipts, Ed Balls has issued a letter with some detailed questions about tax evasion and HSBC (as opposed to tax avoidance and window cleaners). The letter asks three questions: 1. Why has there only been one prosecution out of 1,100 names? Was the “selective prosecution policy” a decision made by Ministers? 2. When were you first made aware of these files, what action did you take and did you discuss it with the Prime Minister? 3. Why did you and David Cameron appoint Lord Green as a Conservative peer and Minister months after the government received these files? 4. Did you and David Cameron discuss tax evasion at HSBC with Lord Green, or did you turn a blind eye?

What’s wrong with our politics? Now that more and people are turning to ‘anti-politics’ parties, this question is becoming steadily more fashionable and urgent. It’s now even got its own BBC Three documentary (the ultimate sign that an issue is dead serious, natch), called An Idiot’s Guide to Politics, presented by Jolyon Rubinstein from the Revolution Will Be Televised. The idea behind the programme was that Rubinstein would examine why people, particularly young adults, are so disengaged from politics and don’t want to vote, and why politics is in such a mess. The picture Rubinstein presented was rather depressing for two reasons.

Ed Miliband’s party has ended up having a reasonably good week, even though it’s been a pretty tough battle. Today’s front pages have not been good at all, something the party leader’s supporters are obviously disappointed by, but given the story about a comparison between the row about Lord Fink’s tax affairs and the hacking of Milly Dowler’s phone was made by an aide, not Miliband, and then reported in a way that was initially misinterpreted, the focus of the row is not Miliband himself. The line about Miliband's own tax affairs was inevitable, too. But it depends whether anyone can find anything to continue the story.

Last night’s meeting of the 1922 Committee was, I hear, not a particularly well-attended affair. This is odd because the speaker was Lynton Crosby, whose confident briefings tend to cheer Tory MPs up no end. But sources who were there say there no more than about 30 MPs in attendance. Crosby gave a short presentation in which he urged backbenchers to return every discussion they had in broadcasts and on the doorstep to the economy, but was then confronted by John Redwood over what the senior backbencher felt was a failure of message discipline from the government. Redwood complained that ministers were repeatedly distracting from the economy at the same time as backbenchers were being lectured about sticking to talking about that topic.

So Ed Miliband really is going to pick one of the bigger battles of his leadership. After Lord Fink demanded that the Labour leader withdraw what he said about the peer at PMQs or to repeat it outside the House of Commons, I've spoken to a Labour source who says: 'These are very serious allegations in the Guardian about Lord Fink, including his complex arrangement to minimise tax. He still has not justified the reason why he's made these arrangements. He should do so. 'David Cameron must explain whether he is happy to have appointed Lord Fink as a treasurer. Then it will be up to the public to judge.' Miliband is going to repeat his allegations outside the Chamber, as soon as he is given the opportunity to do so.

Labour is launching its women’s campaign tomorrow, and Guido has discovered that part of this special campaign is a special battle bus. A pink bus. A pink bus with ‘Woman to Woman’ on it. This is odd, from a party whose MPs are quite keen on campaigning for gender neutral toys and which lent its support to the Pink Stinks campaign. Where will the pink van go? To shopping centres and nail bars? Perhaps it will offer manifesto manicures, where the party’s pledge card is stuck onto acrylic nails so that women can’t forget about what Labour is offering - because as the No campaign in the Scottish independence referendum reminded us, it’s pretty difficult thinking about Big Things when you’ve got the housework to do.

After being told by the Tories that he has ‘questions to answer’ on the BBC story about HSBC, Ed Balls has decided to tell the Tories that they have ‘questions to answer’ on the story too. The Speaker has just granted Shabana Mahmood an urgent question in the Commons demanding that the Chancellor answer Labour’s questions about the story. The Shadow Chancellor said that ‘there are very serious questions for George Osborne and David Cameron to answer today’. His questions are why has there only been one prosecution out of 1,100 individual implicated in allegations about tax evasion and why Stephen Green, former Chairman of HSBC, was appointed a minister after the government was informed of the bank’s activities.