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"I will be sitting in this position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, adding that if the conversation went well, he might invite us into Number 10 for another chat next year.

For a PM, there's never truly downtime for those in the top job. In the hour before the interview began, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his close ally, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was much longer than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

With the year starts, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just a little downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have resulted in better spirits than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are set to get better?

Internal Doubts

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that many of his fellow MPs are convinced he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would rather take a risk and get him out this year.

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

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "assessed at the poll", arguing nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 may be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the fight of our generation and I aim to be at the forefront," he declared.

The Spring Test

The issue for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to protest, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But although 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 resign, even if one of his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He attempted to explain his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was reasonably anxious for things to get better. He sought to assure the interviewer, and the public, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economy would improve despite rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government enacted during their initial turbulent year began to take effect.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the qualification that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western allies were now talking about how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His central argument is that soon the country will "see an improvement".

A Consistent Script

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

However, in spite of facing demands from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with greater political direction, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his points were familiar ones.

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

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

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

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister admitted that he regretted saying he was "happy" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when past remarks he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer attributed it to "the system" for failing to identify 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 progresses. His alliance with the US president entails a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the idea he would be at ease with such action seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

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

Opponents wanted him to denounce it prior to we spoke. And the government is likely to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also always been bubbling desire in the Labour party to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer pledge to integrate further with the single market – the giant economic European market – will probably provoke accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to undo the decisions that followed Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will delight a faction on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to