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"I'll be positioned in the same office by 2027," Starmer stated, adding that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for another conversation in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never truly break for leaders. In the hour before our chat started, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to understand exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was much longer than normal, had ended, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the new year begins, Sir Keir seems to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just some downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly seemed to have put him in improved morale than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a terrible political year for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are set to turn around?

Party Concerns

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

However Sir Keir was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "judged at the next election", insisting nobody would take his five-year mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the battle of our generation and I intend to be at the forefront," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The problem for the PM is that he will be judged long before then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – up to a point. But although he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, should one of his MPs challenged him for the job, should those elections be very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He tried to explain his unpopularity by saying the public was understandably eager for things to get better. He sought to convince me, and the public, that 2026 would be a change.

The economic situation would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the administration implemented during their initial choppy year began to take effect.

• He vowed to close asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't put a new date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it was not a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners 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 soon the country will "see an improvement".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have communicated with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – less tense, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering calls from various quarters for a bolder approach, with greater political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political difficulty, does he need a change of tack?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its own way.

Sir Keir's challenges are not only because governing is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, even in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM told me that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting clear political dangers as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

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

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "longtime champion of international law" but the public "just do not have the complete details at the moment".

Some called for him to criticise the action prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has long been simmering pressure in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new specific pledge to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely provoke protests that he is reneging on his vow never to try to undo the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will please many on his backbenches, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to