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"I'll remain in this office by 2027," Starmer remarked, noting that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might invite us into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever downtime for those in the top job. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was far more extended than normal, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had a kind of a reboot. Maybe even just a bit of downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they believe his standing are poised to improve?

Internal Doubts

The grisly truth for the PM is that a significant number of his colleagues are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and remove him in 2026.

However Sir Keir was rejecting the idea when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he stated he'd be "assessed at the next election", insisting nobody would take his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to replace leader.

"This is the fight of our times and I plan to guide the party," he said.

The Spring Test

The issue 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 argue, maybe too much, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would step down, even if a his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He tried to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the public was reasonably eager for things to improve. He sought to assure the interviewer, and the public, that 2026 would be a change.

The economic situation would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the administration put in place during their initial rocky year began to show results.

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not put a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the qualification that it was not a certainty, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His core argument is that this year the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing calls from many directions for a bolder strategy, with much more political direction, more vigour, more speed and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

Given that he is in considerable political peril, is a different approach required a change of tack?

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

Sir Keir's problems are not just because government is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have erred, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an backlash when comments he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir blamed "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 obvious political perils as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the notion he would be content with such action seems far-fetched.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "longtime champion of international law" but the public "simply lack the entire story at the moment".

Some wanted him to condemn 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.

There has also consistently been simmering desire in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's heading in that direction, but his new specific commitment to align more closely with the EU's single market – the giant economic European market – will likely elicit howls that he is reneging on his promise never to try to reverse the results that followed Brexit.

A move to cosy up to more of the single market will satisfy some on his backbenches, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to