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"I'll remain in the same office by 2027," Starmer stated, adding that if the discussion went well, he might welcome us into his official residence for another conversation next year.

For a PM, there's never any break for those in the top job. Shortly before the interview began, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out what on earth 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 usual, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the new year begins, Starmer seems to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Maybe even just a bit of relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have left him in better spirits than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are about to improve?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that a significant number of his colleagues believe he's not very good at his job. Some of them would rather gamble and oust him this year.

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

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the poll", maintaining no one would take his term from him – even if the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to change its leader.

"This is the struggle of our lifetime and I plan to guide the party," he affirmed.

Upcoming Local Votes

The issue for the PM is that he will be assessed well ahead of then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to protest, perhaps 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 – in part. But although he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would step down, should a his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the electorate was reasonably impatient for things to change. He tried to persuade me, and the public, that this year would be a change.

The economy would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the government enacted during their initial turbulent year began to show results.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't put a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the qualification that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

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

Political Challenges

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

However, in spite of encountering demands from many directions for a bolder strategy, with much more political clarity, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

Given that he is in such significant political difficulty, should he consider a different script?

No government, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its own way.

Sir Keir's problems are not only because government is hard, but because he and his colleagues have erred, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when past remarks he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

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

And he is courting clear political risks as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the thought he would be content with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

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

Opponents demanded condemn it prior to the interview. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has always been growing pressure in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM denies he's pursuing that, but his new specific plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely elicit howls that he is reneging on his vow never to try to undo the choices that followed Brexit.

A decision to align with more of the single market will delight many on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to