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"I'll be positioned in this office by 2027," the Prime Minister stated, joking that if the discussion went well, he might welcome the interviewer into Downing Street for another chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never any time off for those in the top job. Just an hour before the interview began, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his close political chum, 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 usual, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the new year begins, Sir Keir appears to have had a kind of a reboot. Perhaps even just some downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly appeared to have left him in a more positive mood than at the saggy conclusion of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they believe his standing are set to improve?

Party Concerns

The harsh truth for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's not very good at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

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

On several occasions he stated he'd be "assessed at the general election", maintaining no one would strip his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to change leader.

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

Upcoming Local Votes

The problem for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to argue, maybe too much, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

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

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

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was understandably anxious for things to improve. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the public, that 2026 would be a change.

The economic situation would improve in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the administration enacted during their initial choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to close asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western allies were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His core argument is that this year 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, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing pressure from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with increased political vision, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his points were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political difficulty, is a different approach required a different script?

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have made mistakes, including 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 after an backlash when past remarks he'd made in the past – 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 fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting obvious political perils as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be content with such action seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but the public "just haven't got the complete details at the moment".

Critics wanted him to denounce it prior to we spoke. And the government is expected to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has long been bubbling tension in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's doing that, but his new more concrete pledge to align more closely with the single market – the vast economic European market – will likely provoke protests that he is breaking his pledge never to try to overturn the decisions that followed Brexit.

A move to align with more of the single market will satisfy a faction on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to