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"I'll be sitting in this office by 2027," Starmer remarked, noting that if the interview proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into his official residence for a follow-up chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever time off for prime ministers. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the year starts, Starmer seems to have had something of a refresh. Maybe even just a little a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly appeared to have resulted in improved morale than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a dreadful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they believe his political fate are set to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that many of his fellow MPs think he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

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

Multiple times he stated he'd be "assessed at the next election", maintaining no one would strip his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the battle of our times and I plan to lead us," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be judged long before then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to contend, 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 – to some extent. But although he may not want to acknowledge 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 a his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections be very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to account for his unpopularity by saying the electorate was naturally impatient for things to improve. He aimed to convince the interviewer, and the public, that 2026 would be a change.

The economy would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when plans the government enacted during their initial rocky year began to take effect.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not set a new date on that.
• He noted too, with the proviso that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace deal 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 discussing how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big message is that this year the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a some time – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering calls from various quarters for a bolder strategy, with increased political clarity, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in this much political peril, does he need a change of tack?

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

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

Regrets and Risks

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

Sir Keir attributed it to "the system" for not realising what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting evident political risks as the year gets going. His alliance 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 thought he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "just haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Opponents called for him to denounce it before the interview. And the government is expected to face further scrutiny to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has long been growing pressure in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely trigger howls that he is breaking his vow never to try to undo the results that followed Brexit.

A commitment to align with more of the single market will please many on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to