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"I will be positioned in this office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer remarked, adding that if our conversation went well, he might welcome us into Downing Street for another conversation in 2026.

There is rarely ever break for those in the top job. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out exactly what had happened in Venezuela, where his big friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was far more extended than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the new year begins, Sir Keir seems to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just a bit of relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

This seemed to have resulted in a more positive mood than at the saggy conclusion of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

But are he and his colleagues kidding themselves if they think his political fate are about to get better?

Internal Doubts

The harsh truth for the PM is that a significant number of his colleagues think he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and get him out this year.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "assessed at the poll", insisting no one would remove his five-year mandate from him – even if the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to replace its leader.

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

The Spring Test

The challenge for the PM is that he will be scrutinised far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

True – in part. But even though he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would step down, even if one of his MPs challenged him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the electorate was understandably anxious for things to change. He aimed to persuade me, and the nation, that this year would be a change.

The economic situation would recover despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the administration implemented during their first turbulent year began to show results.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, although he did not put a new date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a settlement in Ukraine felt more likely 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 coordinate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His core point is that this year the country will "see an improvement".

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from many directions for a bolder approach, with greater political direction, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his explanations were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, should he consider a change of tack?

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

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

Regrets and Risks

The PM 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 past remarks he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting clear political dangers as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be comfortable with these events seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "just do not have the full picture at the moment".

Critics demanded criticise the action prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also consistently been simmering pressure in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM denies he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete pledge to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European market – will probably provoke protests that he is breaking his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

A move to align with more of the single market will satisfy some on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to