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"I'll be sitting in the same position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, noting that if our interview was successful, he might welcome us into his official residence for another conversation in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever break for leaders. Just an hour before the interview began, the PM had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our lengthy talk, which was far more extended than typical, had finished, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the new year begins, the Prime Minister appears to have had a degree of a refresh. Perhaps even just a bit of a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

This appeared to have put him in a more positive mood than at the sluggish end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his allies deluding themselves if they reckon his standing are poised to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the PM is that numerous of his colleagues believe he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "judged at the next election", maintaining no one would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to switch leader.

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

The May Elections

The issue for the PM is that he will be judged well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to argue, maybe 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 although he may not want to concede it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

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

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the public was understandably impatient for things to improve. He tried to assure me, and the nation, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economic situation would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government put in place during their initial rocky year began to take effect.

• He committed to close asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the proviso that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His central argument is that in 2026 the country will "turn the corner".

Political Challenges

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

However, in spite of encountering calls from various quarters for a bolder approach, with much more political direction, more urgency, more speed and more urgency, his arguments were familiar ones.

Given that he is in such significant political peril, should he consider a change of tack?

No administration, and especially not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, has everything its own way.

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

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the process" for not catching 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 progresses. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be comfortable with these events seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

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

Some wanted him to condemn it prior to the interview. And the government is expected to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has long been bubbling desire in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's doing that, but his new specific pledge to integrate further with the EU's single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will probably elicit protests that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to overturn the decisions that followed Brexit.

A commitment to align with more of the single market will satisfy a faction on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to