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"I'll remain in this office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, noting that if our interview went well, he might invite the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up conversation in the coming year.

There is never any downtime for leaders. Just an hour before the interview began, Starmer had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his big friend, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

With the new year begins, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a reboot. Perhaps even just some relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

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

But are he and his allies kidding themselves if they think his fortunes are about to improve?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and oust him in 2026.

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

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "assessed at the next election", maintaining nobody would strip his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to change leader.

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

The Spring Test

The challenge for the PM is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to argue, perhaps 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 although he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would resign, should a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He tried to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the electorate was understandably anxious for things to get better. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the nation, that 2026 would be different.

The economy would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the administration enacted during their first turbulent year began to show results.

• He vowed to close asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His big point is that soon the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

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

But despite encountering demands from many directions for a bolder strategy, with greater political vision, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

Given that he is in this much political trouble, is a different approach required a different script?

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

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

Controversies and Dangers

The PM told me 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 after an controversy when statements he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the system" for not realising what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting obvious political dangers as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president entails a new risk after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be comfortable with these events seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong proponent of international law" but we "simply lack the full picture at the moment".

Critics called for him to denounce it before we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also long been growing pressure in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM denies he's heading in that direction, but his new specific plan to align more closely with the single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will probably provoke howls that he is going back on his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that followed Brexit.

A move to cosy up to 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