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"I will be positioned in this position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, joking that if our discussion was successful, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for another talk in the coming year.

There is never any time off for those in the top job. Shortly before we sat down, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was much longer than usual, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the new year begins, Sir Keir appears to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Maybe even just a bit of a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

This seemed to have left him in a more positive mood than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a dreadful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his political fate are about to improve?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his fellow MPs are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and remove him in 2026.

But Starmer was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he stated he'd be "assessed at the general election", maintaining no one would remove his electoral mandate from him – even if the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to switch leader.

"This is the battle 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 judged long before then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to protest, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

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

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, even if one of his colleagues ran against him for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to account for his unpopularity by saying the electorate was understandably impatient for things to get better. He aimed to convince me, and the public, that this year would be different.

The economic situation would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the administration enacted during their initial turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he did not put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering demands from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with greater political direction, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his points were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in this much political difficulty, should he consider a different script?

No government, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, gets everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's challenges are not just because government is hard, but because he and his team have erred, including in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The PM expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" 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 – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer blamed "procedures" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing evident political risks as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the idea he would be comfortable with these events seems far-fetched.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He told me he was a "career-long champion of international law" but the public "just lack the full picture at the moment".

Opponents called for him to denounce it before the interview. And the administration is likely to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

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

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new specific commitment to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European market – will likely elicit protests that he is breaking his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

A decision to align with more of the single market will delight many on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to