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"I will be sitting in the same seat by 2027," Starmer stated, joking that if the conversation was successful, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up conversation next year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever time off for leaders. Shortly before we sat down, Sir Keir had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his close friend, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

A Reboot for the New Year

With the new year begins, Sir Keir seems to have had something of a reboot. Maybe even just a little downtime with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have put him in better spirits than at the difficult end of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are about to improve?

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the PM is that many of his party members think he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and get him out in 2026.

However Sir Keir was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "judged at the general election", maintaining no one would remove his five-year mandate from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 may be for Labour to change its leader.

"We are in the battle of our times and I intend to guide the party," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be judged long before then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – to some extent. But even though he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would resign, should a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was understandably anxious for things to get better. He aimed to persuade me, and the nation, that 2026 would be different.

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

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western partners were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big message is that soon the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

The PM may have communicated with greater vigour than observed from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with greater political direction, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his points were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in this much political difficulty, does he need a different script?

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

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, including in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister expressed regret that he was sorry for 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 made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting evident political risks as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the thought he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "career-long champion of international law" but the public "simply haven't got the complete details at the moment".

Some wanted him to condemn it before the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also consistently been simmering desire 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 align more closely with the EU's single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will probably elicit howls that he is going back on his promise never to try to reverse the results that followed Brexit.

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