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"I'll be sitting in this position by 2027," Starmer remarked, joking that if our discussion went well, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever time off for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our lengthy talk, which was far more extended than normal, had finished, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the new year begins, Sir Keir seems to have had something of a reboot. Maybe even just some downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

This seemed to have resulted in improved morale than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they think his political fate are set to improve?

Party Concerns

The grisly truth for the PM is that a significant number of his colleagues are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would rather take a risk and oust him this year.

However Starmer was having none of it when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "assessed at the general election", arguing nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 might be for Labour to replace its leader.

"This is the struggle of our lifetime and I intend to guide the party," he declared.

The Spring Test

The challenge for the PM is that he will be judged long before then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, even if one of his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, should those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his unpopularity by saying the electorate was understandably impatient for things to improve. He tried to convince me, and the nation, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economic situation would improve despite rising unemployment, he said, when plans the government put in place during their first rocky year began to show results.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he did not set a new date on that.
• He noted too, with the proviso that it wasn't a certainty, that a settlement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major 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 potential peace.

His big argument is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

The PM may have spoken with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing pressure from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with much more political vision, more vigour, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were familiar ones.

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

No administration, 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 team have made mistakes, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister expressed regret that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an outcry when comments he'd made in the past – such as 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 fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is facing clear political perils as the year unfolds. His close relationship with the US president takes on a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "simply lack the entire story at the moment".

Some called for him to condemn it before the interview. And the government is expected to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

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

The PM denies he's pursuing that, but his new firmer pledge to move closer with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely trigger howls that he is breaking 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 some on his backbenches, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to