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"I will be positioned in the same office by 2027," Starmer stated, noting that if our conversation went well, he might invite the interviewer into Downing Street for another chat in 2026.

For a PM, there's rarely ever break for leaders. Shortly before our chat started, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was far more extended than normal, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the year commences, Starmer seems to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Maybe even just a bit of a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have left him in a more positive mood than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his standing are about to get better?

Party Concerns

The grisly reality for the leader is that numerous of his fellow MPs are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and get him out in 2026.

However Sir Keir was having none of it in the interview on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "evaluated at the next election", insisting no one would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the fight of our lifetime and I aim to guide the party," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to argue, maybe too much, 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 be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would step down, even if a his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections be very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the public was understandably anxious for things to improve. He sought to persuade the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be distinct.

The economic situation would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when strategies the administration 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 caveat that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a settlement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to coordinate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – calmer, perhaps, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of encountering demands from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with much more political vision, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his explanations were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, does he need a different script?

No government, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, gets everything its as planned.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The PM expressed regret 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 backlash when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer attributed it to "the process" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is facing evident political dangers as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president acquires a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be content with these events seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "simply lack the complete details at the moment".

Critics called for him to denounce it before we spoke. And the administration is likely to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has consistently been simmering desire in the Labour party to revisit some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's doing that, but his new firmer commitment to move closer with the EU's single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably provoke howls that he is going back on his vow never to try to reverse the results that flowed from Brexit.

A decision to cosy up to more of the single market will satisfy many on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to