As the new leader of Scottish Labour, Jim Murphy faces a difficult job.

He is taking over the reins of a party with a broken organisation, depleted activist base and a lost sense of purpose.

Opinion polls are also suggesting the 2011 Holyrood election disaster for Labour, which saw the SNP rout the party, may not be its lowest point.

Recent YouGov snapshots ­estimate that the Nationalists will hammer Labour next year by becoming the largest party in terms of seats and votes.

Murphy's task is twofold: he must rejuvenate his party by forcing it to face the realities of a Scotland transformed by the experience of 2014, and he must attempt to reclaim the social justice agenda from the SNP.

Scottish Labour's policy-making apparatus has long been uninspiring and the East Renfrewshire MP must make sure his party's best brains produce policies that could transform people's life chances.

There was not much evidence of blue-sky thinking during Murphy's campaign. Instead, he backed a series of initiatives, such as a 50p tax rate, that are already Labour policy.

His party's lack of autonomy from UK Labour is another decades-long problem that needs to be resolved quickly.

In 1992, Jack McConnell was interviewed for the post of ­Scottish General Secretary in a hotel in Preston. Seven years later, Alex Rowley was axed from the same job by power-brokers south of the border.

Weeks ago, Johann Lamont quit as Scottish Labour leader after her general secretary was removed by UK officials.

For Murphy to control his party, he must have far greater financial autonomy than he has at present.

He must hire and fire his own staff and pay their salaries from Scottish Labour coffers.

We have heard Labour say it has learned lessons from electorial defeats but we have yet to see any changes which show those claims are genuine.

For all those challenges, the biggest problem now facing Labour in Scotland may be Murphy himself.

He said yesterday that he wants to reach out to Yes voters, but few politicians on either side were more divisive during the referendum than him.

It is also difficult to imagine the MP seizing the high ground on social justice. He was, after all, a supporter of the Iraq war, ID cards and savings from the welfare budget.

As a Blairite, Murphy is exactly the sort of Labour politician who has plunged his party into this crisis.

If he wants to transform his party, he will have to try bury his past and adapt to very different political circumstances. Can he do it? We doubt it.