CAMILA WEATHERS STORM OVER CLAIMS OF SON'S DRUG ADDICTION

The 24-year-old son of Camilla Parker-Bowles, the long-standing companion of
the Prince of Wales, was last night trying to weather the media storm
provoked by allegations he used cocaine.

Tom Parker-Bowles, who is Charles's godson and a friend of Prince William,
is trying to carry on with his duties as a film publicist at the Cannes
Festival, and has been assured he will not lose his job. He has not
commented publicly about the drug allegations, made in a number of Sunday
papers, but the claims are bound to raise concerns in Royal circles, given
his close friendship with the teenage heir to the thrown, eight years his
junior.

According to reports, Mr Parker-Bowles, who is in Cannes working for the
film publicist firm Dennis Davidson Associates (DDA), admitted having a
drugs problem after being seen taking cocaine at a party.

The Sunday Times said Mr Parker Bowles called his mother from Cannes on
Saturday and admitted his drug abuse. According to the paper, close friends
of Mr Parker-Bowles issued a statement saying: "he is very sorry about all
this and humbled by it, and knows that he has been very stupid.

"He is very upset by the whole affair, particularly for dragging his parents
into it. He has promised them that he has hardly ever done this and will not
do it ever again." Another report, in the News of the World, claimed that on
Friday, Eton and Oxford-educated Mr Parker Bowles had offered to supply
drugs to a girl in Cannes.

He offered nothing but a broad smile and a brief no comment to reporters
waiting outside his Cannes hotel, yesterday morning. DDA released a
statement, yesterday, strongly backing its beleaguered employee, and
insisting he would not be sacked.