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"I'll be sitting in this office by 2027," the Prime Minister remarked, joking that if our conversation went well, he might invite us into Downing Street for another conversation in 2026.

There is never any time off for leaders. In the hour before the interview began, the PM had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was much longer than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the year commences, Starmer appears to have had something of a refresh. Perhaps even just a bit of a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly seemed to have put him in improved morale than at the difficult end of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they reckon his political fate are set to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the PM is that many of his fellow MPs think he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and get him out sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "assessed at the poll", arguing nobody would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to change its leader.

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

Upcoming Local Votes

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 councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would step down, should one of his MPs challenged him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He sought to explain his unpopularity by saying the voters was reasonably impatient for things to improve. He tried to convince me, and the public, that this year would be a change.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the administration enacted during their first rocky year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he did not set a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the proviso that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His central point is that soon the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

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

But despite facing demands from various quarters for a bolder approach, with greater political direction, more vigour, more speed and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

Given that he is in such significant political difficulty, should he consider a new narrative?

No administration, and especially not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its as desired.

Sir Keir's problems are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have made mistakes, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The PM 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 past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting clear political dangers as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president acquires a new jeopardy 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 notion he would be content with this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but we "simply haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to condemn it prior to we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has long been bubbling pressure in the Labour party to revisit some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new specific pledge to align more closely with the EU's single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably provoke protests that he is breaking his vow never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

A decision 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