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"I will remain in this office by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, adding that if our interview was successful, he might invite us into Number 10 for another talk next year.

For a PM, there's never any break for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to understand precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the year commences, the Prime Minister seems to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Maybe even just some relaxation with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have put him in better spirits than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a dreadful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his allies deluding themselves if they reckon his standing are poised to improve?

Internal Doubts

The grisly truth for the PM is that many of his colleagues think he's not very good at his job. Several of them would rather gamble and remove him in 2026.

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

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the general election", insisting nobody would take his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to change its leader.

"This is the battle of our lifetime and I aim to lead us," he affirmed.

The May Elections

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, even if a his MPs ran against him for the job, should those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He tried to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was reasonably anxious for things to change. He sought to convince the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be a change.

The economy would improve despite rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government put in place during their first rocky year began to show results.

• He committed to shut asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't put a new date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

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

A Consistent Script

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than observed from him for a some time – calmer, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing pressure from within his own party for a bolder strategy, with much more political vision, more vigour, more pace and more urgency, his points were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political trouble, should he consider a change of tack?

No administration, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, gets everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's challenges are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have erred, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister expressed regret that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when comments he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

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

And he is inviting obvious political dangers as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president takes on a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes 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 idea he would be comfortable with these events seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "simply lack the complete details at the moment".

Some wanted him to criticise the action prior to the interview. And the administration is expected to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

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

Sir Keir denies he's doing that, but his new specific plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably trigger howls that he is breaking his promise never to try to reverse the decisions that followed Brexit.

A decision to align with more of the single market will satisfy many on his backbenches, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to