Blair in a boater, a crude hand gesture, and the Class of '75

In his youth, Tony Blair's rebellious streak often landed him in trouble. He was almost expelled from school for persistent rule-breaking and was once arrested as he tried to climb into his dormitory through a window.

The future Prime Minister remained equally impish when at Oxford - as this extraordinary picture of him making a lewd hand gesture demonstrates.

One of his contemporaries revealed that the young Blair was lucky to escape a second brush with the law after "flashing" from a college window as a student prank.

Peregrine Sharrock gave a vivid account of how, in his final year reading law at St John's, Blair dropped his tennis shorts in the hope of attracting the attention of female staff at a solicitor's office across the road.

Fortunately for him, the women either failed to notice his full-frontal display or turned a blind eye to it, as no complaint was made to the college and the incident was forgotten - until now.