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"I will remain in this seat by 2027," Starmer remarked, adding that if our interview was successful, he might invite us into Number 10 for another talk in the coming year.

There is rarely ever downtime for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his close friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

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

That certainly seemed to have left him in improved morale than at the sluggish end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they think his standing are poised to get better?

Leadership Questions

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and oust him in 2026.

However Starmer was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "judged at the general election", arguing nobody would strip his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to replace leader.

"This is the fight 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 assessed long before then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout 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 unrelated to Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, even if one of his MPs ran against him for the job, should those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He tried to explain his unpopularity by saying the public was naturally impatient for things to get better. He tried to assure the interviewer, and the nation, that 2026 would be a change.

The economy would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when plans the administration implemented during their initial rocky year began to show results.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not set a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it was not a done deal, that a settlement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

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

Political Challenges

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from within his own party for a bolder approach, with greater political clarity, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

Given that he is in considerable political trouble, should he consider a new narrative?

No administration, and especially not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, has everything its as planned.

Sir Keir's problems are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his team have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM 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 statements he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer blamed "the process" 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 gets going. His close relationship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over his career, the thought he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but we "simply do not have the full picture at the moment".

Opponents called for him to condemn it prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has long been bubbling tension in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM denies he's pursuing that, but his new specific pledge to align more closely with the single market – the giant economic European market – will likely trigger howls that he is breaking his promise never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

A commitment to align with more of the single market will delight some on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to