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"I will be positioned in this seat by 2027," Starmer remarked, adding that if our discussion went well, he might invite the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up conversation in 2026.

There is rarely ever break for those in the top job. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his close ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our lengthy talk, which was far more extended than normal, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

With the year commences, Starmer appears to have had something of a refresh. Maybe even just a bit of a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly appeared to have left him in improved morale than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a awful political year for him.

But are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they think his standing are about to get better?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the PM is that many of his party members are convinced he's not very good at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and remove him this year.

However Sir Keir was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the next election", insisting nobody would take his term from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to replace its leader.

"This is the struggle of our lifetime and I intend to guide the party," he declared.

Upcoming Local Votes

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

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would resign, should a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the voters was reasonably eager for things to change. He tried to persuade me, and the nation, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economic situation would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when strategies the government implemented during their first choppy year began to show results.

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a new date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His core message is that soon the country will "reach a turning point".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing calls from within his own party for a bolder approach, with greater political clarity, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

Given that he is in considerable political peril, should he consider a change of tack?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its as planned.

Sir Keir's challenges are not just because governing is hard, but because he and his team have faltered, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

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

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

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

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be at ease with these events seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

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

Some demanded denounce it prior to the interview. And the administration is expected to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also consistently been simmering desire in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's doing that, but his new firmer plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the vast economic European market – will likely provoke protests that he is breaking his pledge never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

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