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"I will be positioned in this seat by 2027," Starmer stated, adding that if our interview was successful, he might welcome the interviewer into Number 10 for another conversation next year.

For a PM, there's never truly break for prime ministers. Just an hour before our chat started, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was much longer than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the year starts, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Maybe even just some relaxation with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have resulted in improved morale than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they think his standing are poised to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that many of his party members are convinced he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would sooner take a risk and remove him this year.

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

On several occasions he told me he'd be "assessed at the next election", insisting nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to switch its leader.

"This is the fight of our times and I intend to be at the forefront," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The problem for the PM is that he will be judged long before then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to contend, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

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

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, even if a his MPs contested his leadership for the job, should those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He sought to account for his unpopularity by saying the public was understandably anxious for things to get better. He tried to persuade me, and the nation, that 2026 would be different.

The economic situation would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the administration implemented during their first choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to close asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't set a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now considering how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His core message is that this year the country will "turn the corner".

Political Challenges

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

However, in spite of encountering calls from various quarters for a bolder strategy, with greater political clarity, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his points were well-known ones.

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

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

Sir Keir's challenges are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister admitted that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

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

And he is inviting obvious political dangers as the year unfolds. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the thought he would be comfortable with these events seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but the public "just do not have the full picture at the moment".

Opponents demanded criticise the action before the interview. And the government is likely to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

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

The PM denies he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete pledge to move closer with the single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably provoke accusations that he is going back on his pledge never to try to undo the results that stemmed from Brexit.

A decision to align with more of the single market will delight some on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to