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"I'll be positioned in the same seat by 2027," the Prime Minister remarked, adding that if our interview was successful, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever time off for prime ministers. Shortly before our chat started, Starmer had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to understand precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than usual, had ended, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year commences, the Prime Minister appears to have had something of a refresh. Perhaps even just some relaxation with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This appeared to have left him in better spirits than at the saggy end of 2025, a dreadful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they believe his political fate are set to improve?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the leader is that a significant number of his fellow MPs are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and get him out sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he insisted he'd be "judged at the poll", maintaining nobody would take his term from him – even if the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to switch leader.

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

Upcoming Local Votes

The issue for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to argue, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no situation under which he would walk away, even if one of his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, should those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his unpopularity by saying the public was reasonably eager for things to get better. He aimed to persuade the interviewer, and the nation, that the coming months would be different.

The economy would improve despite rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the government put in place during their first rocky year began to show results.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His core point is that this year the country will "turn the corner".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – calmer, maybe, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of encountering pressure from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with greater political clarity, more vigour, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

Given that he is in considerable political trouble, should he consider a new narrative?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its own way.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an outcry when past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer blamed "the system" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting evident political perils as the year gets going. His close relationship with the US president entails a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the idea he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong proponent of international law" but the public "simply do not have the full picture at the moment".

Critics wanted him to denounce it before the interview. And the government is expected to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also consistently been simmering pressure in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's pursuing that, but his new firmer plan to align more closely with the single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely elicit accusations that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to overturn the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A move to cosy up to more of the single market will delight a faction on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to