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"I'll remain in the same seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, adding that if the interview was successful, he might welcome the interviewer into Number 10 for another conversation in the coming year.

There is never truly break for those in the top job. In the hour before we sat down, the PM had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than usual, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the year starts, Sir Keir seems to have had a degree of a refresh. Maybe even just a bit of a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the sluggish end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are set to get better?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable reality for the PM is that numerous of his party members think he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and get him out in 2026.

But Starmer was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the next election", insisting nobody would strip his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 may be for Labour to replace its leader.

"We are in the struggle of our lifetime and I intend to be at the forefront," he declared.

The May Elections

The challenge for the PM is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would walk away, even if one of his MPs ran against him for the job, should those elections be very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He attempted to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was understandably impatient for things to change. He sought to assure me, and the public, that 2026 would be distinct.

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

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a new date on that.
• He said too, with the proviso that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His core point is that in 2026 the country will "reach a turning point".

Political Challenges

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

However, in spite of facing calls from many directions for a more decisive approach, with greater political direction, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political peril, should he consider a change of tack?

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

The Prime Minister's problems are not only because governing is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when statements he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

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

And he is courting obvious 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 former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the thought he would be content with such action seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but we "just do not have the entire story at the moment".

Some called for him to criticise the action before we spoke. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also always been growing tension in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the results of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's doing that, but his new more concrete commitment to align more closely with the single market – the huge economic European market – will probably provoke howls that he is going back on his promise never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

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