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"I'll remain in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, adding that if the discussion went well, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for another talk in the coming year.

There is rarely ever downtime for prime ministers. Shortly before our chat started, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to work out precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was far more extended than normal, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the year starts, Sir Keir appears to have had a kind of a reboot. Perhaps even just a little a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

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

But are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they reckon his fortunes are about to get better?

Leadership Questions

The grisly truth for the prime minister is that numerous of his colleagues think he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would rather gamble and remove him sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "judged at the poll", maintaining nobody would strip his five-year mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to switch its leader.

"We are in the battle of our lifetime and I plan to be at the forefront," he declared.

The May Elections

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

True – up to a point. But even though he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would step down, even if one of his MPs contested his leadership for the job, should those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to explain his unpopularity by saying the public was naturally impatient for things to improve. He sought to convince me, and the nation, that 2026 would be a change.

The economy would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the government put in place during their first rocky year began to show results.

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it was not a done deal, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now considering how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

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

A Consistent Script

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

However, in spite of facing calls from many directions for a more decisive approach, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his arguments were repeated ones.

Given that he is in this much political trouble, is a different approach required a new narrative?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its as planned.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister admitted 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 controversy when past remarks he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the process" 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 perils as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but the public "simply haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Some called for him to denounce it before we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the coming days.

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

Sir Keir disputes he's doing that, but his new more concrete plan to move closer with the EU's single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will likely trigger protests that he is going back on his vow never to try to reverse the choices that followed Brexit.

A commitment to integrate into more of the single market will please some on his side of the party, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to