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"I'll be positioned in the same office by 2027," Starmer stated, adding that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for a follow-up talk in 2026.

There is never any time off for prime ministers. Shortly before our chat started, the PM had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his close friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was much longer than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the year commences, Starmer seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just a little relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This appeared to have put him in improved morale than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

But are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his political fate are set to improve?

Party Concerns

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that a significant number of his party members think he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would rather gamble and get him out in 2026.

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

Multiple times he told me he'd be "judged at the next election", maintaining nobody would take his five-year mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the battle of our times and I aim to guide the party," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

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

Accurate – up to a point. But although he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, even if one of his colleagues ran against him for the job, if those elections be very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was understandably impatient for things to change. He aimed to convince the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be different.

The economic situation would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he said, when plans the administration put in place during their initial rocky year began to take effect.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't put a firm date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big argument is that soon the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering demands from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with greater political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his explanations were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political trouble, is a different approach required a change of tack?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, has everything its as planned.

Sir Keir's challenges are not just because government is challenging, but because he and his team have faltered, including in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he regretted saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when statements he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Starmer blamed "procedures" for not realising what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting clear political dangers as the year gets going. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be at ease with these events seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "just haven't got the complete details at the moment".

Some wanted him to criticise the action prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also always been bubbling tension in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's doing that, but his new more concrete commitment to move closer with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European market – will likely provoke accusations that he is going back on his promise never to try to overturn the results that stemmed from Brexit.

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