“‘If we don’t do it now, we’ll never do it,” says Ian Hunter, 70 years old, though he looks closer to 50. Then a smile. “I just want to know what it’ll feel like.” It’s early Wednesday afternoon, in a cavernous modern hotel next to Tower Bridge in London. Hunter, his eyes covered by his ever-present sunglasses, has just arrived in the company of most of the original lineup of Mott the Hoople; some of whom, I will later discover, have not set on eyes on each other for 30 years…”

“Like a lot of my generation, I suffer from what the author Douglas Coupland once called Legislated Nostalgia: essentially, possessing a lot of someone else’s memories. Since a babysitter played me Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band in 1975 I never really recovered. I have shelves full of Beatles books, and a pitifully huge collection of their records. I have followed their trail around Liverpool and Hamburg, and once made a pilgrimage to a supermarket that John Lennon had once owned on Hayling Island (should you be barmy enough to follow suit, the locals are very helpful).

“Moreover, since my mid-20s I have been a happy accessory to the ever-growing Beatles industry. Only last month, I interviewed Paul McCartney for a cover story in Mojo magazine. Having since received all the CDs, I can vouch that they sound immeasurably better than before and the mono versions are occasionally revelatory. And yet, after nearly a month of non-stop Beatles coverage, even I am sick of the sight of them.”

I watch 27-year-old Nathan reluctantly talking through details of his life with a personal adviser who suspects that this jobseeker is not doing quite what he is told. On the screen is a list of qualifications – four or five GSCEs at grade D, a diploma in sound engineering – and a sketchy employment history that drew to a close recently with the end of his six-month contract at the Cadbury factory in nearby Bournville.

The usual rules apply: most of the jobs require previous experience, and Nathan hasn’t got any. He casts me a knowing smirk, then looks back at the face on the other side of the desk. “That’s the problem with most of these jobs,” he says. “How are you going to get any experience?”

For the first time, even the adviser sounds less than enthusiastic. “If you’ve got the right qualifications and skills,” he says, “you should still apply for the job.”

More vacancies flit across the screen, for “employment administrators”, “trainee advisers” and the like. Just about all of them pay less than £6 an hour.

“What’s the minimum wage now?” asks Nathan. When reminded, he emits a fatalistic “pffft” sound, and cracks another smirk.