Cooking

There's bigging up and there's BIGGING UP.

The all-new international, national, regional and local newshour that will make or break the new BBC Scotland channel has a Chief News Correspondent.

It is to be James Cook, seen on network news this past year reporting from the US west coast. He's done forest fires and been snotty about Trump. Now, the press release tells us, he's really quite something.

Editor Hayley Valentine says "James has star quality and will be a huge asset. This is one of the key appointments on the new programme and James was the outstanding candidate.

"He will bring all of his editorial rigour, authority and energy, and we are delighted that he has chosen to come back to Scotland at such an exciting and important moment in BBC Scotland’s history."

He is widely viewed as one of Scotland’s top broadcast journalists - a great story-teller and a hugely engaging TV reporter.

Listen to James engaging with a falling treewhile reporting on a hurricane in Hawaii.