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"I'll remain in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer remarked, adding that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up conversation in the coming year.

There is never any downtime for prime ministers. Just an hour before the interview began, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was much longer than typical, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the new year begins, Starmer appears to have had something of a refresh. Perhaps even just some downtime with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have resulted in better spirits than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

But are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are poised to improve?

Internal Doubts

The harsh truth for the PM is that a significant number of his fellow MPs think he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and get him out sooner rather than later.

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

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "judged at the next election", insisting no one would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to replace its leader.

"We are in the fight of our lifetime and I plan to lead us," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The challenge for the PM is that he will be scrutinised long before then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – in part. But even though he may be reluctant to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would resign, even if one of his colleagues ran against him for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the public was naturally anxious for things to improve. He aimed to convince the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be different.

The economy would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he said, when strategies the administration implemented during their first choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not set a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the qualification that it wasn't a done deal, that a settlement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big message is that this year the country will "see an improvement".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering calls from many directions for a more decisive approach, with much more political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his explanations were well-known ones.

Given that he is in such significant political peril, should he consider a different script?

No government, and especially not one that has been unpopular for many months, has everything its as desired.

Sir Keir's problems are not only because government is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The PM expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when comments he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Starmer blamed "the process" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing evident political perils as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president takes on a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the thought he would be content with these events seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "just do not have the full picture at the moment".

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

And there has consistently been growing tension in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete pledge to move closer with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European market – will probably trigger howls that he is breaking his pledge never to try to undo the results that followed Brexit.

A decision to align with more of the single market will delight some on his backbenches, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to