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"I will be sitting in this position by 2027," Starmer remarked, adding that if our conversation was successful, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for another talk next year.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for prime ministers. Just an hour before our chat started, the PM had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was far more extended than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister appears to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just some relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they believe his political fate are about to turn around?

Leadership Questions

The grisly reality for the leader is that numerous of his fellow MPs are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and remove him this year.

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

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "judged at the next election", insisting no one would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to switch leader.

"We are in the fight of our lifetime and I plan to be at the forefront," he declared.

The Spring Test

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to protest, maybe too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

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

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would step down, should a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, should those elections be very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He attempted to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was reasonably impatient for things to get better. He tried to assure me, and the nation, that 2026 would be a change.

The economy would improve 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 empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he did not put a firm date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His core message is that in 2026 the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have communicated with more energy than observed from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering demands from within his own party for a bolder approach, with increased political clarity, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political trouble, should he consider a change of tack?

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

Sir Keir's challenges are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The PM admitted 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 after an controversy when past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer attributed it to "the system" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting obvious political perils as the year progresses. His close relationship with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be comfortable with such action seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but the public "simply haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Critics demanded denounce it prior to we spoke. And the government is expected to face more pressure to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also always been simmering tension in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new more concrete pledge to move closer with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European trading zone – will probably elicit protests that he is breaking his vow never to try to undo the decisions that followed Brexit.

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