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"I'll be sitting in the same office by 2027," Starmer remarked, noting that if our discussion went well, he might welcome the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up talk next year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever break for prime ministers. Shortly before the interview began, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was much longer than usual, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the year starts, the Prime Minister seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just a bit of relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly appeared to have put him in better spirits than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a dreadful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his allies deluding themselves if they reckon his standing are about to get better?

Leadership Questions

The harsh truth for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather gamble and get him out sooner rather than later.

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

Repeatedly he stated he'd be "evaluated at the poll", insisting nobody would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the struggle of our times and I plan to guide the party," he declared.

The May Elections

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to contend, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – in part. But even though he may not want to concede it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would resign, even if one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He tried to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was understandably eager for things to get better. He sought to persuade the interviewer, and the nation, that 2026 would be a change.

The economy would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the administration implemented during their initial choppy year began to show results.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a new date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western allies were now talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His core message is that soon the country will "turn the corner".

Political Challenges

The PM may have spoken with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of encountering pressure from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with much more political direction, more vigour, more speed and more immediacy, his points were familiar ones.

Given that he is in such significant political difficulty, does he need a new narrative?

No administration, and especially not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its as desired.

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is hard, but because he and his colleagues have erred, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an backlash when statements he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir attributed it to "procedures" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing clear political perils as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president takes on a new risk 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 his career, the notion he would be content with such action seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

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

Some called for him to denounce it before we spoke. And the government is expected to face more pressure to give an explicit view in Parliament in the near future.

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

The PM rejects he's doing that, but his new specific commitment to move closer with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably elicit accusations that he is reneging on his vow never to try to reverse the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will please some on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to