YOU could be forgiven for calling them gluttons for punishment.

The candidates for the Scottish Labour leader and deputy leader are finalised today and yet another contest gets underway.

With no-one giving the party much hope of winning the Scottish Parliament election next year the victors could quickly become the vanquished.

If Labour as expected fails to oust Nicola Sturgeon as First Minister next May they cannot simply remove yet another leader or expect them to resign, only to go through the whole ‘we’ve not been good enough, we need to listen’ routine again.

Labour needs to create stability within the party that can allow it over time to be seen as an alternative government.

Politics might be about policies in the day to day business of parliaments and government, but elections are about identity and credibility.

On both counts Labour has lost out heavily to the SNP over the course of recent electoral cycles.

There was once a time when a young working class person developing an interest in politics would look no further than Labour to find a natural home.

Not anymore. It is increasingly unlikely at any political demonstration you will find any great number of Labour supporters.

The referendum campaign drew tens of thousands of people previously unpoliticised, or only with a passing interest, towards the SNP.

There is now a sizeable constituency for whom identification with the Labour Party is as unlikely as it would be with the Tories.

Then there is the credibility factor.

Since Jack McConnell left office in 2007 there hasn’t been a single Labour leader who the public believed to be a credible alternative to Alex Salmond as First Minister and the prospect of toppling Nicola Sturgeon looks even more unlikely with each passing week.

It is not just the leader, but the team built around them.

When the SNP took over at Holyrood in 2007 there was a clutch of politicians believed to be up to the job of government.

John Swinney, Nicola Sturgeon, Kenny MacAskill were at the forefront and were crucial in their re-election as a majority government four years later.

Since then others have developed like Humza Yousaf, Derek Mackay, Michael Matheson and Keith Brown seen as capable holding high ministerial office. You can add to that the dozens of new MPs looking to make their mark.

The Labour Party has not been able to demonstrate that it possesses that capability since it has been in opposition.

It takes time to build an opposition capable of earning the public’s trust to govern.

Whoever emerges as the new Labour leadership team has a mountain to climb and will be starting form sea level.

A task of that magnitude takes patience and endurance and the party has to be prepared to give them the necessary time.