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"I'll remain in the same office by 2027," Starmer stated, noting that if our discussion went well, he might invite us into Number 10 for another conversation in 2026.

There is never any downtime for leaders. Shortly before our chat started, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had finished, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the new year begins, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just a little relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

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

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they believe his fortunes are set to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that many of his colleagues believe he's not very good at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and remove him this year.

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

Repeatedly he stated he'd be "assessed at the general election", arguing nobody would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the struggle of our times and I plan to guide the party," he affirmed.

The May Elections

The challenge for the PM is that he will be assessed well ahead of then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to contend, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would step down, even if one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections prove disastrous for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to explain his unpopularity by saying the voters was reasonably impatient for things to change. He sought to assure me, and the nation, that the coming months would be different.

The economy would strengthen notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when plans the administration implemented during their first rocky year began to bear fruit.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't 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 more likely now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western partners were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

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

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – less tense, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from within his own party for a bolder approach, with increased political clarity, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were repeated ones.

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

No government, and especially not one that has been unpopular for many months, has everything its own way.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The PM expressed regret that he regretted 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 made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir blamed "procedures" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting clear political dangers as the year progresses. His alliance with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the notion he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but the public "just do not have the entire story at the moment".

Critics called for him to condemn it before we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also consistently been simmering pressure in the Labour party to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new firmer plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the huge economic European market – will likely provoke accusations that he is breaking his vow never to try to undo the decisions that followed Brexit.

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