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"I'll be sitting in this position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer remarked, adding that if our conversation was successful, he might invite us into his official residence for another conversation in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never truly downtime for leaders. Just an hour before our chat started, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was far more extended than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the year commences, Sir Keir appears to have had a kind of a refresh. Maybe even just a bit of downtime with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This appeared to have resulted in improved morale than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

But are he and his allies kidding themselves if they believe his fortunes are about to turn around?

Leadership Questions

The harsh reality for the leader is that a significant number of his colleagues are convinced he's not very good at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and remove him sooner rather than later.

But Starmer was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "assessed at the poll", insisting no one would strip his five-year mandate from him – even if the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 may be for Labour to switch its leader.

"This is the battle of our generation and I plan to be at the forefront," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the PM is that he will be judged well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to protest, maybe too much, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – up to a point. But although he may not want to admit 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 walk away, even if one of his MPs contested his leadership for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He tried to account for his unpopularity by saying the public was reasonably impatient for things to improve. He aimed to persuade me, and the public, that 2026 would be a change.

The economic situation would improve despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the government put in place during their initial rocky year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't set a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now talking about how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

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

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering pressure from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with greater political clarity, more vigour, more speed and more urgency, his points were well-known ones.

Given that he is in this much political peril, is a different approach required a change of tack?

No administration, 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 hard, but because he and his team have erred, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an backlash when comments he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the process" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting obvious political dangers as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's intervention 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 implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but the public "simply lack the entire story at the moment".

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

And there has always been growing tension in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the outcomes of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer pledge to move closer with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European market – will likely elicit protests that he is breaking his pledge never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

A move to align with more of the single market will please a faction on his backbenches, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to