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"I will remain in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, joking that if the discussion was successful, he might invite us into his official residence for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for those in the top job. In the hour before our chat started, the PM had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year commences, the Prime Minister seems to have had a degree of a reboot. Perhaps even just a little downtime with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly appeared to have left him in a more positive mood than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they believe his standing are about to get better?

Party Concerns

The harsh reality for the leader is that numerous of his colleagues are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and remove him sooner rather than later.

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

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "judged at the poll", maintaining nobody would strip his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to change leader.

"This is the fight of our lifetime and I aim to be at the forefront," he declared.

The May Elections

The challenge for the PM is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to protest, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may not want to concede it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would resign, even if a his colleagues ran against him for the job, should those elections prove disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to account for his unpopularity by saying the public was naturally anxious for things to change. He sought to persuade me, and the public, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economic situation would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the administration enacted during their initial choppy year began to take effect.

• He pledged to close asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't set a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a settlement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

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

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with increased political clarity, 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 change of tack?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its as desired.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister told me that he regretted saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when comments he'd made in the past – such as 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 more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting obvious political perils as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the thought he would be comfortable with such action seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but we "just haven't got the entire story at the moment".

Some wanted him to condemn it prior to the interview. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has long been growing desire in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's heading in that direction, but his new more concrete pledge to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European market – will probably provoke accusations that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to overturn the choices that flowed from Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will please some on his own side, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to