His teary X Factor audition

The northern hunk told a tear-jerking sob story about his childhood claiming to have never known his real parents and then made a bid for his real family to get in touch. Judges voted him through to boot camp, with Cheryl Cole and Dannii Minogue both shedding a tear for his tale.

His father revealed that his son in fact lives near his mother and that he spoke to his father on the phone weeks earlier. Turner later revealed that he merely meant to say he did not know his parents as well as he would like as he spent part of his childhood with his foster gran. He said: "The emotion of the audition got to me. I didn't realise what I was saying would be taken that way. I never meant to deceive anyone."

The story continued with the singer insisting that he was no liar and revealed more details about his troubled childhood, how both parents abandoned him by the age of four and that he was abused as a child by a family friend.