FORMER Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and former Northern Ireland Secretary Mo Mowlem will come to Swindon next summer as part of what looks set to be the town's biggest literary festival.

Festival director Matt Holland today revealed that he has scooped larger towns and cities to book two of the biggest names to be doing the literary festival circuit next year.

He said: "It really is a coup. Mrs Thatcher is getting on now and only likes to make a few appearances around the country to promote her book. One of Mrs Thatcher's agents said that he understands Swindon is the cultural gateway to the west."

The 75-year-old former premiere will speak at the Wyvern Theatre to promote her new book Statecraft. Anyone buying a book on the night will also have the chance to meet the lady in person.

Ex-cabinet minister Mo Mowlem will also be giving a talk at the Wyvern Theatre on a different night, to promote her hotly anticipated memoir entitled Momentum.

The Swindon Festival of Literature, which has been going for eight years, has already hosted some of the biggest names in writing.

They include Kate Adie, Melvyn Bragg, Germaine Greer, Douglas Hurd and Michael Foot.

But the Iron Lady is undoubtedly the festival's biggest catch.

Novelists Will Self and Howard Jacobson, fantasy writer Terry Pratchett and comedian Arthur Smith are among the other star attractions at next year's event, which runs from May 1 to 11.

News of the festival's high-profile bookings comes in the same week that a question mark has been placed over the whole future of the event.

Swindon Borough Council is proposing to scrap the financial assistance it currently gives the event as part of a swingeing set of budget cuts.

Mr Holland said: "It's a direct threat to the literature festival and I'm very concerned about it."