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"I'll be sitting in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, adding that if the interview went well, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up conversation in 2026.

For a PM, there's never truly downtime for prime ministers. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big friend, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the year starts, the Prime Minister seems to have had something of a revitalisation. Maybe even just a little downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

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

But are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they believe his political fate are set to get better?

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's not very good at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and oust him this year.

But Sir Keir was rejecting the idea in the interview on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "assessed at the general election", arguing nobody would take his term from him – despite the fact that the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to switch its leader.

"This is the fight of our lifetime and I aim to be at the forefront," he declared.

Upcoming Local Votes

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be judged well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would walk away, should a his MPs contested his leadership for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was naturally impatient for things to improve. He tried to convince me, and the nation, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economic situation would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government implemented during their initial turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

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

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with greater political vision, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

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

No government, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its as planned.

Sir Keir's problems are not only because governing is difficult, but because he and his team have erred, even in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when past remarks he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

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

And he is inviting clear political perils as the year gets going. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be content with these events seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "lifelong proponent of international law" but the public "simply lack the complete details at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to condemn it before the interview. And the administration is expected to face more pressure to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also long been growing pressure in the Labour party to revisit some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's doing that, but his new firmer pledge to integrate further with the single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably elicit protests that he is breaking his vow never to try to reverse the decisions that stemmed from Brexit.

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