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"I'll remain in the same office by 2027," Starmer stated, joking that if our interview was successful, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up talk in 2026.

There is never any time off for prime ministers. Shortly before we sat down, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

With the year starts, Sir Keir seems to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Maybe even just some downtime with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

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

But are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they reckon his political fate are set to get better?

Party Concerns

The harsh reality for the leader is that a significant number of his fellow MPs believe he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and get him out sooner rather than later.

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

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "judged at the next election", maintaining nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to switch its leader.

"This is the struggle of our generation and I plan to lead us," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised well ahead of then – in a major 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 devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But although he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would resign, even if a his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections prove disastrous for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the public was reasonably eager for things to get better. He tried to convince me, and the public, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when plans the government enacted during their first choppy year began to take effect.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he did not put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western partners were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His core message is that this year the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

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

However, in spite of encountering demands from within his own party for a bolder approach, with greater political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his points were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political trouble, does he need a change of tack?

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

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because government is challenging, but because he and his team have made mistakes, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when statements he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

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

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

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over his career, the thought he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "career-long advocate of international law" but the public "simply lack the full picture at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to criticise the action before the interview. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also always been bubbling desire in the Labour party to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new specific commitment to move closer with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably elicit accusations that he is reneging on his promise never to try to reverse the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will please some on his own side, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to