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"I'll remain in the same seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, joking that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might invite us into Downing Street for a follow-up chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for leaders. In the hour before our chat started, the PM had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher precisely had transpired in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was much longer than usual, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had a degree of a reboot. Maybe even just a little relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

But are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they reckon his political fate are about to improve?

Leadership Questions

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and get him out this year.

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

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the next election", maintaining nobody would strip his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to switch leader.

"We are in the battle of our generation and I aim to lead us," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The problem for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised long before then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would resign, should one of his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the public was reasonably anxious for things to improve. He sought to assure the interviewer, and the nation, that this year would be a change.

The economy would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when policies the administration implemented during their initial choppy year began to show results.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not set a firm date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western partners were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

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

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering demands from within his own party for a bolder strategy, with increased political vision, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, is a different approach required a new narrative?

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

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

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he regretted saying he was "happy" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when past remarks he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Starmer attributed it to "the process" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting clear political perils as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "longtime champion of international law" but the public "just lack the entire story at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to denounce it before we spoke. And the administration is likely to face further scrutiny to give an definitive 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 outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the huge economic European market – will probably trigger howls that he is breaking his vow never to try to reverse the decisions that followed Brexit.

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