The government makes for Hay while the sun shines

I’m writing this from the Hay Festival which seems to be populated by an unusually large number of government ministers. I spotted Michael Gove wandering along Newport Street eating an ice cream on Sunday afternoon and later this week I’m hoping to catch Nick Clegg being interviewed by Philippe Sands. If this annual gathering of the liberal intelligentsia is anything to go by, the Guardian-reading classes are completely at ease with the coalition government.

This was evident in a very good-humoured event I attended at which Jon Snow, the urbane Channel 4 newsreader, interviewed David Willetts, the Minister of State for Universities and Science. Willetts is in town to promote The Pinch, his attack on the Baby Boomers for feathering their nest at the expense of their children. He has calculated that by the end of their lives the Boomers will have taken out 118 per cent of what they’ve put in, leaving the next generation with smaller houses, higher taxes and a degraded environment.