Boris Johnson appears to have finally admitted taking cocaine after mounting questions dogged his Tory leadership battle.
Asked directly when he last used the Class A drug, the Tory leadership frontrunner replied by saying a "single inconclusive event" when he was a teenager.
Asked if he had taken cocaine since then, he replied: "No."
Mr Johnson was quizzed by BBC Radio 4's The World At One after this week.
He was asked to clarify if he had taken illegal drugs after giving conflicting accounts of the incident in previous years, before he stood for the leadership.
Back on Wednesday he said: "I think the account of this event when I was 19 has appeared many, many times.
"I think what most people in this country want us to really focus on in this campaign, if I may say so, is what we can do for them and what our plans are for this great country of ours."
This time he was asked directly when he last took cocaine.
And he replied: "I've answered that question exhaustively.But I can tell you the canonical answer that's been given - a single inconclusive event that took place, note my words, a single inconclusive event that took place when I was a teenager, and which I’ve extensively described already on the BBC."
Asked if he had taken cocaine since then, he said: "No."
It follows a row over his rival Michael Gove - who confessed he'd taken the drug on several social occasions in the past, despite writing about the evils of it.
Mr Johnson admitted in 2005 he was given cocaine but “may have been doing icing sugar” and it did not go up his nose.
Two years later, he told GQ magazine that it “must have” gone into his nose but claimed that it had no effect.
In 2018, he claimed it happened when he was 19 but when that led to headlines which said he had admitted taking drugs he issued a denial.
“To say that I have taken cocaine is simply untrue,” he claimed.
