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"I will be positioned in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, joking that if the conversation was successful, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up conversation in 2026.

There is rarely ever break for those in the top job. Just an hour before the interview began, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had something of a refresh. Maybe even just a bit of relaxation with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This seemed to have put him in better spirits than at the difficult end of 2025, a awful political year for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they reckon his fortunes are about to improve?

Internal Doubts

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that a significant number of his colleagues think he's not very good at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and remove him this year.

But Sir Keir was rejecting the idea in the interview on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "judged at the next election", insisting no one would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to change its leader.

"This is the battle of our generation and I aim to lead us," he declared.

The Spring Test

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

True – to some extent. But although he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no situation under which he would resign, even if one of his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, should those elections prove very poor 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 aimed to persuade me, and the public, that 2026 would be different.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the government enacted during their first rocky year began to show results.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His core point is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have communicated with greater vigour than observed from him for a while – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering pressure from many directions for a more decisive approach, with much more political direction, more dynamism, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political trouble, does he need a new narrative?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, has everything its own way.

Sir Keir's problems are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his team have made mistakes, even in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM expressed regret that he regretted saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when statements he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer attributed it to "procedures" 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 perils as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "career-long advocate of international law" but we "just haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Opponents demanded condemn it prior to the interview. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has consistently been bubbling pressure in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's pursuing that, but his new specific plan to move closer with the single market – the vast economic European market – will probably elicit accusations that he is reneging on his vow never to try to undo the results that followed Brexit.

A move to align with more of the single market will satisfy many on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to