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"I'll be sitting in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, adding that if our discussion proceeded smoothly, he might welcome the interviewer into Number 10 for another chat next year.

There is rarely ever time off for prime ministers. Shortly before our chat started, Starmer had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to understand precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was much longer than normal, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

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

That certainly seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his allies being unrealistic if they reckon his political fate are about to turn around?

Leadership Questions

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that a significant number of his fellow MPs think he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would rather gamble and get him out in 2026.

However Starmer was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the poll", arguing nobody would strip his term from him – even if the most effective strategy of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the fight of our generation and I intend to guide the party," he said.

The May Elections

The problem for the PM is that he will be judged well ahead of then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

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

This did not stop Sir Keir implying that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, even if a his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections be very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to account for his unpopularity by saying the electorate was understandably eager for things to get better. He aimed to persuade the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be distinct.

The economy would improve in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when strategies the government put in place during their initial turbulent year began to show results.

• He vowed to close asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't set a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the qualification that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a settlement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now considering how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His big argument is that soon the country will "turn the corner".

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have communicated with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing pressure from within his own party for a bolder strategy, with greater political direction, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political peril, does he need a change of tack?

No administration, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its as desired.

The Prime Minister's challenges are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have made mistakes, including in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted 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 past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Starmer attributed it to "the process" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

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

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

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

Opponents wanted him to denounce it prior to we spoke. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

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

The PM disputes he's pursuing that, but his new firmer commitment to integrate further with the single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely provoke protests that he is reneging on his promise never to try to undo the results that stemmed from Brexit.

A move to integrate into more of the single market will delight a faction on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to