Former Scottish secretary defeats Neil Findlay and Sarah Boyack with 55.8% of the vote

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

Jim Murphy has been announced as the new leader of the Scottish Labour party.

The former Scottish secretary took 55.8% of the vote to defeat Holyrood health spokesperson Neil Findlay (34.5%) and former Scottish executive minister Sarah Boyack (9%) to win the leadership.

Kezia Dugdale, MSP for the Lothian region, was elected as the party’s deputy leader.

Speaking after the results were announced on Saturday, Murphy described winning the role as “a remarkable honour”. He added: “Scotland is changing and so too must Scottish Labour. I’m ambitious for our party because I’m ambitious for our country.”

Murphy, who played a prominent role in the No campaign ahead of the referendum on Scottish independence, had been the favourite to win. Bookmakers Ladbrokes said that 90% of the money it had taken for the contest had been for the East Renfrewshire MP.

He appealed to those who voted for independence in the referendum: “There can be no excuses now: we have the power, the question is do we have the purpose?”

The leadership contest was sparked when Johann Lamont stood down in late October after accusing colleagues in Westminster of treating Scotland like a “branch office”.

Under the electoral college system used, a third of the votes were decided by Scottish Labour parliamentarians. Another third went to party members in Scotland, with the remainder were allocated to members of affiliated trade unions.

The ballot closed on Wednesday, with Murphy saying then the contest had been a “good advert” for the party: “We have had three good candidates showing the best of our party and the trade-union movement ... I have seen Scottish Labour Party members fired up and ready to start winning again.”

Labour has been out of power in Scotland since 2007 and recent polls have suggested it is trailing the SNP in voting intentions for both Holyrood and Westminster. With the general election less than five months away Murphy will have little time to reverse Labour’s declining support north of the border.

The party won 41 of the 59 Scottish constituencies in the 2010 Westminster election and leader Ed Miliband will hope Labour can again return a large number of Scottish MPs to help boost his chances of becoming the next prime minister.

Meanwhile, Scottish MPs would be banned from having the final say over legislation that does not affect their constituents, under Conservative proposals to be published next week.