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"I'll be positioned in this position by 2027," Starmer stated, joking that if the interview went well, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for a follow-up chat in 2026.

There is never truly break for those in the top job. Shortly before the interview began, Starmer had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the year commences, Starmer seems to have had a degree of a refresh. Perhaps even just a little downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have put him in improved morale than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they believe his standing are set to improve?

Internal Doubts

The grisly truth for the leader is that many of his party members think he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would rather gamble and remove him sooner rather than later.

But Starmer was dismissing such talk during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he stated he'd be "evaluated at the poll", arguing no one would strip his five-year mandate from him – even if the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to switch leader.

"This is the struggle of our times and I aim to be at the forefront," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be assessed long before then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to contend, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, even if one of his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He tried to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the voters was reasonably impatient for things to get better. He tried to convince me, and the public, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economic situation would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the government enacted during their initial turbulent year began to take effect.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he did not set a firm date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a certainty, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now discussing how to coordinate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His core argument is that in 2026 the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a some time – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing demands from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with greater political direction, more urgency, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were repeated ones.

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

No administration, and especially not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's problems are not only because governing is hard, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister 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 backlash when statements he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Starmer attributed it to "procedures" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting clear political risks as the year progresses. His alliance with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the thought he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "simply do not have the entire story at the moment".

Opponents called for him to condemn it prior to the interview. And the government is expected to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has consistently been bubbling tension in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's doing that, but his new firmer commitment to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European trading zone – will likely provoke protests that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to overturn the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

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