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"I will remain in the same seat by 2027," the Prime Minister stated, noting that if the interview was successful, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for another chat in the coming year.

There is never any downtime for leaders. In the hour before the interview began, the PM had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just 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 Reboot for the New Year

But as the new year begins, the Prime Minister appears to have had a kind of a reboot. Maybe even just a bit of relaxation with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This appeared to have put him in a more positive mood than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they reckon his standing are poised to improve?

Internal Doubts

The grisly truth for the prime minister is that a significant number of his colleagues believe he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would rather take a risk and oust him this year.

However Starmer was rejecting the idea in the interview on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the poll", insisting nobody would strip his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to switch leader.

"We are in the struggle of our generation and I plan to lead us," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The problem for the PM is that he will be scrutinised well ahead of then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to contend, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – in part. But even though he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would step down, should one of his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to explain his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was reasonably impatient for things to change. He sought to assure me, and the nation, that the coming months would be a change.

The economy would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the administration put in place during their initial choppy year began to show results.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he did not set a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western partners were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

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

Political Challenges

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

However, in spite of encountering calls from within his own party for a bolder approach, with greater political clarity, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were repeated ones.

Given that he is in considerable political peril, is a different approach required a different script?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, has everything its own way.

Sir Keir's problems are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have erred, even in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

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

Sir Keir attributed it to "procedures" for not realising what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting evident political perils as the year unfolds. His close relationship with the US president acquires 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 this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

Policy Stances and Pressures

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

Critics called for him to denounce it before the interview. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has long been simmering desire in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the results of Brexit.

The PM denies he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete plan to move closer with the single market – the vast economic European market – will likely elicit howls that he is reneging on his vow never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will satisfy a faction on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to