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"I will be sitting in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, joking that if our discussion went well, he might invite the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up conversation in 2026.

For a PM, there's never any break for leaders. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to work out precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year commences, the Prime Minister seems to have had something of a reboot. Maybe even just a little a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have resulted in better spirits than at the saggy end of 2025, a terrible political year for him.

But are he and his allies deluding themselves if they think his standing are set to get better?

Internal Doubts

The harsh truth for the PM is that numerous of his fellow MPs believe he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

However Starmer was dismissing such talk during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he stated he'd be "evaluated at the next election", insisting nobody would remove his term from him – even if the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to replace its leader.

"This is the struggle of our lifetime and I aim to be at the forefront," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be judged well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to argue, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

True – to some extent. But although he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would walk away, should one of his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections be disastrous for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He attempted to explain his unpopularity by saying the public was understandably impatient for things to improve. He aimed to assure the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be distinct.

The economy would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when policies the government put in place during their first turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

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

But despite encountering pressure from within his own party for a bolder strategy, with much more political vision, more urgency, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, is a different approach required a different script?

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because government is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

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

And he is inviting evident political dangers as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be content with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

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

Opponents wanted him to criticise the action before the interview. And the government is likely to face more pressure to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

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

Sir Keir rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new specific pledge to align more closely with the single market – the giant economic European market – will probably provoke protests that he is reneging on his promise never to try to overturn the results that followed Brexit.

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