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"I'll be positioned in this office by 2027," Starmer declared, joking that if our conversation proceeded smoothly, he might welcome the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's never truly break for leaders. In the hour before we sat down, the PM had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was far more extended than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the year commences, the Prime Minister appears to have had a degree of a reboot. Perhaps even just a little a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly seemed to have left him in improved morale than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they think his fortunes are about to get better?

Leadership Questions

The harsh truth for the leader is that numerous of his party members believe he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would sooner gamble and remove him sooner rather than later.

However Starmer was rejecting the idea in the interview on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he stated he'd be "judged at the next election", arguing nobody would take his term from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to switch leader.

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

The Spring Test

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to contend, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – to some extent. But even though he may not want to concede 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 colleagues ran against him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He tried to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was naturally eager for things to improve. He tried to persuade me, and the public, that this year would be different.

The economy would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when strategies the administration implemented during their initial choppy year began to show results.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he did not set a new date on that.
• He said too, with the proviso that it was not a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His core message is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Familiar Arguments

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

But despite facing pressure from many directions for a bolder approach, with much more political vision, more vigour, more speed and more urgency, his explanations were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political trouble, should he consider a new narrative?

No government, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, gets everything its own way.

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

Regrets and Risks

The PM expressed regret that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an outcry when statements he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the process" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting clear political perils as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the idea he would be content with these events seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He told me he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but the public "simply haven't got the complete details at the moment".

Opponents demanded denounce it prior to we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has long been simmering pressure in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's pursuing that, but his new firmer pledge to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European trading zone – will likely trigger accusations that he is going back on his promise never to try to undo the decisions that followed Brexit.

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