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"I will be sitting in the same seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer remarked, joking that if our conversation went well, he might invite us into Downing Street for another chat in the coming year.

There is rarely ever downtime for leaders. Just an hour before the interview began, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his big friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once the discussion, which was far more extended than usual, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year commences, Sir Keir seems to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just a little relaxation with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have left him in a more positive mood than at the sluggish end of 2025, a dreadful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they reckon his political fate are set to get better?

Party Concerns

The harsh reality for the leader is that numerous of his colleagues believe he's not very good at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and remove him sooner rather than later.

But Sir Keir was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "assessed at the next election", arguing nobody would strip his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to change its leader.

"This is the struggle of our times and I plan 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 across the UK. He tried to protest, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – in part. But although he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would resign, should a his colleagues ran against him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He tried to explain his unpopularity by saying the voters was understandably anxious for things to improve. He tried to assure the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be different.

The economy would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the government implemented during their initial choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not set a new date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now considering how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His central message is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering calls from many directions for a more decisive strategy, with increased political clarity, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were repeated ones.

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

No administration, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its own way.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The PM told me 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 past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Starmer blamed "the system" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting obvious political perils as the year progresses. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new risk after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be comfortable with such action seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but the public "just lack the complete details at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to denounce it prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also always been growing pressure in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete commitment to integrate further with the single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably elicit protests that he is going back on his promise never to try to overturn the decisions that followed Brexit.

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