Liberal Democrat leadership contender Simon Hughes has admitted having gay relationships.
The party president last week denied he is homosexual, but confirmed to the Sun newspaper on Thursday that he has had a number of relationships with men.
The revelations follow former leader Charles Kennedy's covering up of his alcohol problems and the resignation of married Lib Dem home affairs spokesman and former leadership candidate Mark Oaten over the weekend after he admitted an affair with a rent boy.
Hughes, who is single, said he was carrying on in the contest and that he hoped his private life could be kept apart from his public role.
"I am perfectly willing to say that I have had both homosexual and heterosexual relationships in the past," he said.
"I hope that does not disqualify me from doing a good job in public life and I propose to carry on doing that with the usual enthusiasm and determination."
Asked by the Independent last week whether he was gay, he said: "The answer is no, as it happens. But if it was the case, which it isn't, I hope that would not become an issue."
However he told the Sun: "Perhaps in the last few days I was overly defensive over questions about my sexuality.
"I have always been open in the past and I regret I was overly defensive last week. That was a mistake.
"I did it and I was trying to make sure that even in the circumstances of potentially standing as leader of the party - or for high office - that private life was private."
Speaking to BBC News 24, leadership rival Sir Menzies Campbell said Hughes had been "an outstanding constituency member of parliament".
Sir Menzies said it was "a matter for him" whether he should have come clean sooner.
"But looking at it objectively and dispassionately from the outside I think it is easy to understand why he might have found it difficult to be as frank as he has been in the last 24 hours," he added.
After three weeks in which the party has been rocked by a series of scandals, the acting leader also called for "some understanding of human frailty and how difficult it is to acknowledge that".
