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"I will remain in this office by 2027," Starmer declared, adding that if the interview was successful, he might welcome us into his official residence for another chat in 2026.

There is rarely ever downtime for prime ministers. In the hour before the interview began, the PM had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was far more extended than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister appears to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just some relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

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

But are he and his allies deluding themselves if they think his political fate are poised to get better?

Leadership Questions

The grisly reality for the PM is that many of his fellow MPs believe he's ineffective at his job. A faction of them would sooner gamble and remove him sooner rather than later.

But Starmer was rejecting the idea in the interview on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he stated he'd be "evaluated at the next election", insisting nobody would strip his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to replace leader.

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

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to protest, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

True – in part. But although he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, even if one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the voters was reasonably eager for things to get better. He aimed to assure the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be distinct.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the administration put in place during their first rocky year began to take effect.

• He pledged to close asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He noted too, with the proviso that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His big point is that soon the country will "reach a turning point".

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with greater political direction, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political difficulty, is a different approach required 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 only because government is hard, but because he and his colleagues have erred, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

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

And he is facing evident political dangers as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president acquires a new risk after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the idea he would be at ease with such action seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but the public "simply do not have the complete details at the moment".

Some demanded condemn it prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also long been simmering tension in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new firmer pledge to integrate further with the EU's single market – the vast economic European market – will probably elicit accusations that he is going back on his pledge never to try to reverse the results that followed Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will satisfy a faction on his own side, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to