Boris may be a classical scholar but he struggled with his mea culpa

It finally happened. After two separate sessions at the dispatch box, over the course of which he fielded no fewer than 67 questions, Boris Johnson at last conceded that he’d made a mistake.

Say what you like about the Foreign Secretary: he certainly makes his opponents work. To recap. Two weeks ago, the Foreign Affairs committee asked Mr Johnson about Nazanin Zaghari-ratcliffe, a British woman imprisoned in Iran. Mr Johnson replied that she’d been “teaching people journalism” there. In fact, she was merely in Iran on holiday. Iranian state media seized on Mr Johnson’s remark, proclaiming it an “inadvertent confession” of their captive’s guilt.

Mr Johnson was now under severe pressure. In the Commons last Tuesday, he attempted to relieve it in an unexpected way: by insisting that he’d never said Mrs Zaghari-ratcliffe was teaching journalism at all. This claim, however, did not appear to satisfy MPS, largely on the grounds that it was untrue. So yesterday Labour ordered Mr Johnson to the dispatch box again.

It was fascinating to watch. Mr Johnson did, as I say, admit his mistake. But he didn’t do it up front. He did it gradually, incrementally, giving ground inch by inch.

First, he told MPS that “the British Government has no doubt that Mrs Zaghari-ratcliffe was in Iran on holiday” and that “my remarks could and should have been clearer”.

Was that enough for Labour MPS? No, they were still calling for his head.

So he gave another inch. He said he apologised “for the distress and suffering caused by the impression that I gave that I believed she was there in a professional capacity”.

Enough? No. Very well. Another inch, then. This time, he said Mrs Zaghari-ratcliffe “was not there in any professional capacity, and insofar as people got a different impression from what I said, that was my mistake”. Note the way, with each answer, his position was subtly shifting: edging ever closer towards admitting he’d been wrong, without quite saying it – and then looking up, to see whether he’d done enough to get everyone off his back. The answer, sadly, was no. Labour MPS were still shouting “Resign!” So now, a full 36 minutes into yesterday’s interrogation, he relented.

“As I’ve said many times,” sighed Mr Johnson, “it was wrong of me to say she was there in a professional capacity.” As a matter of fact, this was the first time he’d said it was wrong of him. In reality, he’d gone from refusing to accept he’d made a mistake, to insisting he simply hadn’t spoken clearly, to conceding that he’d given the wrong impression, to admitting that he had made a mistake after all.

And yet, despite having changed his position all those times, he was now claiming, with a straight face, to have been consistent all along.

If Tory MPS want a leader with unshakeable self-confidence, they’ve surely found their man.