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"I'll remain in the same office by 2027," Starmer stated, adding that if our discussion went well, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation in 2026.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for leaders. Shortly before our chat started, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to understand what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister appears to have had a degree of a refresh. Maybe even just some relaxation with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have left him in better spirits than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

But are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they reckon his standing are set to turn around?

Party Concerns

The grisly truth for the prime minister is that many of his colleagues are convinced he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would sooner take a risk and remove him in 2026.

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

Multiple times he stated he'd be "judged at the general election", arguing no one would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to switch its leader.

"This is the fight of our times and I aim to lead us," he affirmed.

The May Elections

The challenge for the PM is that he will be scrutinised well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, perhaps too much, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But although he may be reluctant to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, should one of his MPs challenged him for the job, should those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was understandably impatient for things to change. He sought to persuade the interviewer, and the nation, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economy would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the government enacted during their initial choppy year began to take effect.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big argument is that this year the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a while – more relaxed, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering calls from many directions for a more decisive approach, with much more political clarity, more urgency, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in this much political peril, does he need a new narrative?

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

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his team have faltered, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an backlash when comments he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Starmer blamed "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 facing obvious political dangers as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "simply lack the entire story at the moment".

Critics demanded denounce it prior to the interview. And the government is expected to face more pressure to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also consistently been growing tension in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete commitment to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European market – will probably elicit protests that he is going back on his pledge never to try to overturn the results that stemmed from Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will please a faction on his own side, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to