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"I'll remain in the same position by 2027," the Prime Minister remarked, noting that if the conversation was successful, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up talk in the coming year.

There is rarely ever break for leaders. Just an hour before the interview began, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was much longer than usual, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister appears to have had a degree of a reboot. Maybe even just some a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a awful political year for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they reckon his political fate are about to turn around?

Leadership Questions

The uncomfortable truth for the leader is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's not very good at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and oust him in 2026.

But Starmer was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he stated he'd be "assessed at the general election", insisting no one 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 switch its leader.

"This is the battle of our generation and I plan to lead us," he affirmed.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to argue, perhaps too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – up to a point. But even though he may be reluctant to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would step down, should one of his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections prove disastrous for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to explain his low poll ratings by saying the public was naturally anxious for things to change. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be distinct.

The economic situation would improve despite rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government enacted during their first turbulent year began to show results.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he did not put a new date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

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

Political Challenges

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

However, in spite of encountering pressure from many directions for a bolder strategy, with greater political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political peril, does he need a change of tack?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its as planned.

The Prime Minister's challenges are not just because government is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

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

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

And he is inviting clear political risks as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president takes on a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but the public "just lack the entire story at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to condemn it prior to the interview. And the government is likely to face more pressure to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has consistently been growing pressure in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's pursuing that, but his new specific commitment to move closer with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European market – will likely provoke howls that he is breaking his promise never to try to undo the choices that flowed from Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will please a faction on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to