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"I will remain in this position by 2027," Starmer declared, joking that if our conversation proceeded smoothly, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up talk in the coming year.

There is never truly downtime for leaders. In the hour before the interview began, Sir Keir had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the year starts, the Prime Minister seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Maybe even just some relaxation with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

This appeared to have left him in better spirits than at the difficult end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

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

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members think he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and get him out this year.

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

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "assessed at the general election", arguing no one would take his term from him – even if the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to change leader.

"This is the battle of our lifetime and I intend to be at the forefront," he said.

The May Elections

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be assessed well ahead of then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to argue, maybe too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would resign, should a his colleagues ran against him for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He tried to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the public was naturally impatient for things to change. He aimed to persuade me, and the public, that this year would be a change.

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

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he did not set a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not 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 discussing how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His big point is that this year the country will "reach a turning point".

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a some time – calmer, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing demands from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with greater political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political difficulty, is a different approach required a change of tack?

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

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because government is hard, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, including 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 backlash when statements he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for not realising what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing clear political risks as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "just do not have the complete details at the moment".

Opponents demanded condemn it prior to we spoke. And the government is expected to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also always been growing desire in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer pledge to move closer with the EU's single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely elicit accusations that he is going back on his pledge never to try to reverse the results that stemmed from Brexit.

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