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"I will remain in this seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, adding that if the discussion went well, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's never any break for leaders. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out precisely had transpired in Venezuela, where his close friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the new year begins, Starmer appears to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just some a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have left him in better spirits than at the difficult end of 2025, a dreadful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his colleagues kidding themselves if they think his fortunes are poised to get better?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the leader is that numerous of his fellow MPs are convinced he's not very good at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and get him out this year.

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

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "assessed at the next election", insisting nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – even if the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 might be for Labour to switch its leader.

"We are in the fight of our times and I aim to be at the forefront," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The issue for the PM is that he will be scrutinised long before then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to protest, perhaps 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 be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, should a his MPs challenged him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was understandably impatient for things to change. He sought to assure the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be different.

The economy would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when strategies the government enacted during their initial choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he did not set a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the qualification that it was not a done deal, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

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

However, in spite of encountering calls from many directions for a bolder approach, with much more political vision, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were familiar ones.

Given that he is in such significant political difficulty, does he need a different script?

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

The Prime Minister's problems are not only because government is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, even in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

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

Starmer blamed "procedures" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting obvious political dangers as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the thought he would be at ease with these events seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "lifelong proponent of international law" but we "simply lack the full picture at the moment".

Critics wanted him to condemn it prior to we spoke. And the government is likely to face more pressure to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also long been bubbling pressure in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's doing that, but his new more concrete pledge to align more closely with the single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will probably elicit accusations that he is reneging on his promise never to try to overturn the results that followed Brexit.

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