He's known for eating politicians for brealkfast on Radio 4's today programme but journalist John Humphry's was worried when a bunch of kids trooped in to take part in Junior Mastermind. A dad himself, he tells Sarah Waterfall how he tackled the poor innocents.

JOHN Humphrys is well-known for eating politicians for breakfast during his early morning show, Today, on Radio 4. So it seemed fitting when he took up the post as presenter of Mastermind last year.

The take-no-prisoners style of interrogation, a mantle passed on from the former quiz master Magnus Magnusson who left in 1997, suited him to a tee. John relishes doing the show and says it's "the easiest job in the world".

But when the producers told him he was to present a children's version of the show, he was none too thrilled.

''I didn't think it would work for two reasons,'' says the 60-year-old presenter. ''I thought you'd either have to dumb down because they're children, in which case it wouldn't be Mastermind. Or, you'd have to stick to the usual thing where the questions were so tough the children would be made to look silly, which would be horrible.''

Changing the style of the show is something John is very much against. Recently an article was published in London's Evening Standard, accusing the show of being dumbed down, criticising the choice of specialist subjects such as Dr Who and Alan Partridge.

Shadow Culture Secretary Julie Kirkbride said: ''I don't think these sort of subjects are the point of Mastermind. With all due respect to Alan Partridge, it is such a shame that so much of television has to play to the lowest common denominator rather than keep some sort of intellectual purity.''

John retorts: ''The show's every bit as tough as it used to be. If Julie thinks talking about popular culture is dumbing down then she must think 90 per cent of the British population has been dumbed down because these are things we're interested in.

''She must inhabit a more rarefied intellectual sphere than us ordinary folk and should accept an invitation to come on a celebrity version of Mastermind so we could pursue the matter.''

But while he's anxious to keep the show's famously rigorous questions, John got quite a shock when the producers showed him a sample of what the youngsters could expect.

''When I saw the first questions, I flipped my lid. They were the sort you'd expect to hear on the normal version of Mastermind. I said we were going to make the children look like idiots. The producers said I was wrong. And indeed I was.

''In the first game, the scores in the specialist round were higher than any we've ever had. It was staggering the amount these children knew.

''You look at them and they're sitting there in this terrible frightening chair and their feet don't even touch the floor. It was so sweet!'' says John. "Your heart goes out to them and you think, 'Oh God, these questions are going to be awful'. I felt like a real brute.

''But in the end I found the whole thing immensely reassuring, encouraging and lovely. The level of knowledge and common sense was wonderful. It gives you new hope, cynic that I am. I'm a 60-year-old hack who's been in the business for 45 years and I came away quite dewy-eyed.''

A father himself, John lives with his partner Valerie Sanderson and their four-year-old son Owen. He also has two grown-up children, Christopher and Catherine, from his marriage to Edna Wilding, who died from pancreatic cancer in 1997. Catherine has a 14-month-old son called Caeo and Christopher, who lives in Athens, has a five-month-old named Hektor.

''Hektor had his first taste of a banana this morning, he did,'' comments grandpa John, suddenly sounding very Welsh. ''You'd have to say there was a bit of doting going on. It's very nice.''

Born in Cardiff, the journalist and presenter was the son of a self-employed French polisher. Money was tight and John, one of six, helped out where he could. He hated school and left at 15.

''One of the things that turned me against school was being caned for being late because of my paper round. I wasn't delivering papers because I wanted to, it was because we were poor. It still rankles me nearly half a century on. Not because of the pain but the injustice of it all.''

To John's delight his elder kids have avoided journalism and completed higher education. ''I wish I'd gone to university. My kids have done, although the youngest hasn't yet because he's only four. Give him a few more months and he'll be ready for it,'' he jokes. ''I'm already telling my four-year-old what's expected of him. And I told my other kids that I would break both arms and legs and cut them off without a penny but otherwise it'd be fine if they wanted to become journalists. I was quite determined that Christopher should become a farmer because I thought that was a great thing to do,'' says John, who owns farmland in West Wales. ''I remember hauling him to four or five different universities trying to persuade him. He went along with it but in the end said he had to do music.''

His hunch was right, Christopher's now a cellist and Catherine a complementary therapist.

Although the plan was to slow down so he could spend more time with Owen than he'd been able to when his elder kids were young, John is showing no signs of sticking to it. ''I can't stop working. I used to tell myself I'd definitely be retired by the time I was 50 and then it was 55, then it was 60. Well, I've signed up for another three years at Today, there's Mastermind and I'm going to write another book.

''I think it's probably my background. My parents were always very hard up and my father was always working desperately hard. We didn't ever actually go hungry but there were periods when money was very short indeed.

''It's the old Welsh Protestant work ethic thing combined with my own experience. Plus, I enjoy it. I think I have enough sense now to realise that I'll stop when it starts becoming a chore. My family nag me, yes. My partner gets annoyed that I keep shifting the goalposts.''

Despite winning awards for his work, he's very self-deprecating about his own talents. ''I got that Sony Gold award for lifetime services to journalism. But when you think about it they can't give it to a 22-year-old can they? They've got to find somebody who's old. Sooner or later, if you survive long enough, they'll get around to you,'' he says.

''It's all a load of nonsense really, I'm no better or worse at my job than 500 or 5,000 other people. I'm always mildly surprised when anything goes right.''

l Junior Mastermind is on BBC One from Monday, August 30.

l Steve Pratt is away