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"I will be positioned in this seat by 2027," Starmer declared, joking that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into his official residence for another chat in the coming year.

There is never truly time off for prime ministers. Just an hour before our chat started, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than usual, had concluded, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year commences, Sir Keir appears to have had something of a reboot. Maybe even just some a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly appeared to have resulted in better spirits than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a dreadful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his allies kidding themselves if they think his standing are set to improve?

Leadership Questions

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that many of his fellow MPs think he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would rather take a risk and get him out this year.

However Starmer was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "judged at the general election", arguing no one would remove his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to replace its leader.

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

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 tried to contend, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – up to a point. But even though he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would resign, even if a his MPs contested his leadership for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to explain his low poll ratings by saying the public was reasonably eager for things to improve. He tried to assure me, and the public, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economy would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government enacted during their initial turbulent year began to show results.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't set a new date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western allies were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His big argument is that soon the country will "turn the corner".

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – less tense, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering pressure from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with greater political direction, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political peril, does he need a new narrative?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its as planned.

The Prime Minister's problems are not only because government is challenging, but because he and his team have made mistakes, even in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when statements he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

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

And he is facing clear political perils as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be at ease with these events seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but we "simply do not have the entire story at the moment".

Opponents demanded denounce it before we spoke. And the government is likely to face further scrutiny to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has long been bubbling desire in the Labour party to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's doing that, but his new firmer pledge to integrate further with the single market – the vast economic European market – will likely trigger protests that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to overturn the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will delight a faction on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to