An elite academy for aspiring rent-gob politicians : 1976 : Durham Union Society

"I'm sorry but you must wear appropriate attire to attend," the usher told me sternly.
I thought I had been dressed normally enough, but apparently not. I was waving my club membership card, having paid the annual subscription during Freshers' Week. Only then did I learn that it was insufficient merely to be a paid-up member. Nobody had told me I needed additionally to wear an academic gown to be admitted, one of those flimsy black material things belonging to previous centuries or ghost movies. Since my arrival at university, I had spotted a few students wafting around the streets wearing such gowns and I had considered their fashion sense preposterous, particularly in the 'Year of Punk'. Why would I waste £37 of my Surrey County Council student full grant on such an anachronistic garment? Now, to my frustration, I was being refused entry to the society's first debate of the academic year and had to walk the mile back to my college in autumnal darkness.