Today host is son of 70s newsreader

RADIO 4 presenter Justin Webb has revealed he is the secret son of respected newsreader Peter Woods.

The Today programme host had no contact with his late father apart from an encounter when Webb was aged six months.

He has kept his identity as Woods's son secret throughout his life.

Woods was a celebrated host of the BBC's flagship Nine O'Clock News and one of the great characters of his day.

Famously, one BBC2 bulletin in the 1970s had to be faded out when he was slurring his words.

Webb, 50, has gone public about his father by writing about him in the new edition of Radio Times.

He said he "buried" his father's identity in his mind, to the extent he felt little connection and never considered getting in touch. But he said he but decided to go public rather than being forced to respond to the news getting out in other ways.

"So although I'm a relatively obscure BBC person I know that the link will be of some perfectly legitimate interest to those who remember my father."

Woods and Webb's mother, Gloria Crocombe, became close while working at the Daily Mirror in the 1950s.