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"I will be sitting in the same position by 2027," the Prime Minister stated, adding that if our interview went well, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation next year.

There is never any time off for leaders. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was far more extended than typical, had finished, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

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

That certainly seemed to have left him in a more positive mood than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

But are he and his allies deluding themselves if they reckon his standing are about to improve?

Leadership Questions

The grisly truth for the PM is that many of his party members believe he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would rather take a risk and oust him sooner rather than later.

However Starmer was dismissing such talk during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "judged at the general election", maintaining nobody would remove his term from him – even if the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the battle of our times and I intend to be at the forefront," he affirmed.

The May Elections

The issue for the PM is that he will be scrutinised well ahead of then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to contend, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

True – up to a point. But even though he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, even if a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, if those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the voters was reasonably anxious for things to change. He aimed to persuade me, and the nation, that the coming months would be different.

The economic situation would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the administration implemented during their first turbulent year began to take effect.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he did not set a new date on that.
• He said too, with the proviso that it wasn't a certainty, that a settlement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western partners were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have communicated with more energy than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from various quarters for a more decisive approach, with greater political clarity, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his points were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political trouble, is a different approach required a different script?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, gets everything its as desired.

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

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister admitted that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when past remarks he'd previously made – such as 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 not my fault.

And he is inviting evident political risks as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president acquires a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the notion he would be at ease with these events seems far-fetched.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "career-long champion of international law" but the public "just do not have the entire story at the moment".

Critics called for him to denounce it before we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has consistently been growing desire in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new more concrete pledge to integrate further with the EU's single market – the huge economic European market – will probably elicit protests that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to overturn the choices that followed Brexit.

A commitment to align with more of the single market will please a faction on his backbenches, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to