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"I will remain in the same seat by 2027," Starmer remarked, joking that if the conversation went well, he might welcome the interviewer into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for those in the top job. In the hour before the interview began, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was much longer than usual, had ended, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the new year begins, Starmer appears to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just some relaxation with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have left him in better spirits than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a awful political year for him.

But are he and his colleagues kidding themselves if they reckon his standing are set to turn around?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the leader is that a significant number of his party members think he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would rather take a risk and remove him this year.

But Starmer was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the general election", maintaining no one would take his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to switch leader.

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

The Spring Test

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

True – in part. But although he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would resign, even if a his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the public was naturally impatient for things to improve. He aimed to persuade the interviewer, and the nation, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economy would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when plans the administration implemented during their first turbulent year began to take effect.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't put a specific 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 comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His core point is that soon the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – calmer, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from many directions for a bolder strategy, with increased political clarity, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his explanations were repeated ones.

Given that he is in this much political difficulty, does he need a new narrative?

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

Sir Keir's challenges are not only because government is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have erred, even in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM told me that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when comments he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

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

And he is inviting obvious political perils as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "simply do not have the complete details at the moment".

Some wanted him to criticise the action before the interview. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also long been simmering tension in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete pledge to move closer with the single market – the huge economic European market – will likely provoke howls that he is going back on his pledge never to try to undo the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A move to cosy up to more of the single market will delight some on his side of the party, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to