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"I will be sitting in this seat by 2027," Starmer declared, joking that if our interview went well, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever downtime for those in the top job. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than usual, had concluded, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the year commences, the Prime Minister seems to have had something of a refresh. Perhaps even just a little downtime with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

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

Yet, are he and his colleagues kidding themselves if they believe his standing are set to improve?

Party Concerns

The grisly reality for the leader is that a significant number of his party members are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would rather gamble and get him out in 2026.

But Starmer was rejecting the idea when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the next election", maintaining no one would strip his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to change its leader.

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

The Spring Test

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

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may not want to acknowledge 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, should a his MPs contested his leadership for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He attempted to account for his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was reasonably eager for things to change. He sought to assure me, and the public, that 2026 would be a change.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when plans the administration implemented during their initial turbulent year began to show results.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he did not put a new date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His central point is that in 2026 the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have communicated with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering calls from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with much more political direction, more vigour, more pace and more urgency, his explanations were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, is a different approach required a change of tack?

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

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

Regrets and Risks

The PM expressed regret that he regretted saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an outcry when comments he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for not realising what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting 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 his career, the notion he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "longtime champion of international law" but we "simply do not have the full picture at the moment".

Some demanded criticise the action before the interview. And the administration is expected to face more pressure to give an clear view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also always been growing tension in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer commitment to move closer with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely elicit accusations that he is breaking his promise never to try to undo the decisions that followed Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will delight many on his own side, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to