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"I'll be positioned in the same seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, noting that if the conversation went well, he might invite us into Number 10 for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever downtime for prime ministers. Shortly before the interview began, Sir Keir had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his big friend, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was far more extended than typical, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year starts, Starmer appears to have had a degree of a refresh. Maybe even just some a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly appeared to have left him in improved morale than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a terrible political year for him.

But are he and his allies deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are poised to get better?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that numerous of his colleagues think he's not very good at his job. A faction of them would sooner gamble and oust him in 2026.

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

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "assessed at the general election", insisting nobody would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 might be for Labour to switch leader.

"We are in the struggle of our lifetime and I plan to lead us," he declared.

The Spring Test

The problem for the prime minister is that he will be judged long before then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to contend, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But although he may be reluctant to acknowledge it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no situation under which he would step down, even if one of his MPs ran against him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was naturally anxious for things to improve. He tried to persuade me, and the nation, that the coming months would be different.

The economic situation would strengthen notwithstanding rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the government enacted during their first rocky year began to show results.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't set a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His central message is that soon the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – less tense, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with much more political clarity, more vigour, more pace and more urgency, his explanations were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, should he consider a different script?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its as desired.

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

Controversies and Dangers

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

Starmer blamed "procedures" for not realising what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing evident political perils as the year unfolds. His close relationship with the US president entails a new risk 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 many years, the notion he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

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

Some demanded condemn it before we spoke. And the administration is expected to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has consistently been bubbling desire in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the results of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new more concrete commitment to move closer with the EU's single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely trigger howls that he is breaking his vow never to try to undo the decisions that stemmed from Brexit.

A commitment to align with more of the single market will please many on his backbenches, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to