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"I'll remain in the same position by 2027," the Prime Minister remarked, noting that if our conversation proceeded smoothly, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever downtime for leaders. In the hour before our chat started, Starmer had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand precisely had transpired in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the year commences, Sir Keir appears to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just a bit of downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have resulted in a more positive mood than at the difficult end of 2025, a dreadful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they reckon his fortunes are about to turn around?

Leadership Questions

The harsh reality for the leader is that many of his fellow MPs believe he's not very good at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and remove him this year.

But Sir Keir was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "assessed at the poll", maintaining no one would take his term from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to switch its leader.

"We are in the struggle of our lifetime and I aim to guide the party," he affirmed.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to contend, maybe too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – in part. But even though he may not want to concede it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, should a his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was reasonably anxious for things to change. He tried to assure the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be distinct.

The economic situation would improve in the face of rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the administration enacted during their first rocky year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to close asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he did not put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now discussing how to coordinate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His core point is that soon the country will "see an improvement".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a some time – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing pressure from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with greater political clarity, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political trouble, should he consider a different script?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, gets everything its as desired.

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his team have erred, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister expressed regret that he regretted saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when statements he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Starmer blamed "procedures" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing obvious political risks as the year gets going. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new risk after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the idea he would be content with this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He told me he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but the public "simply lack the full picture at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to criticise the action prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also consistently been bubbling pressure in the Labour party to revisit some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely provoke howls that he is reneging on his promise never to try to reverse the results that followed Brexit.

A move to integrate into more of the single market will satisfy some on his backbenches, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to