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"I will be sitting in the same position by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, joking that if our discussion proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever break for those in the top job. Shortly before our chat started, the PM had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher exactly what had happened in Venezuela, where his close friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was considerably lengthier than usual, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the new year begins, Starmer seems to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just a bit of relaxation with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly seemed to have put him in improved morale than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a dreadful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they think his political fate are poised to improve?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable truth for the prime minister is that numerous of his fellow MPs think he's ineffective at his job. A faction of them would sooner take a risk and get him out this year.

But Sir Keir was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he stated he'd be "evaluated at the general election", insisting nobody would strip his five-year mandate from him – even if the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the fight of our times and I plan to guide the party," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The problem for the PM is that he will be scrutinised long before then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, even if a his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to explain his unpopularity by saying the electorate was naturally impatient for things to improve. He sought to assure me, and the public, that the coming months would be a change.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the government put in place during their first turbulent year began to show results.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a new date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His central point is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

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

But despite facing calls from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with increased political clarity, more urgency, more speed and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

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

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

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

Starmer attributed it to "procedures" for not realising what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting obvious political dangers as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president takes on a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former 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 told me he was a "longtime advocate of international law" but we "just do not have the complete details at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to denounce it before the interview. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an definitive view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also long been growing desire in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's pursuing that, but his new firmer commitment to move closer with the single market – the giant economic European market – will probably provoke accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to overturn the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

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