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"I'll remain in the same office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, adding that if the discussion went well, he might welcome us into his official residence for another chat in the coming year.

There is rarely ever break for prime ministers. In the hour before our chat started, Starmer had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to work out precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was much longer than typical, had ended, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had a degree of a refresh. Perhaps even just a little a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the saggy end of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they reckon his political fate are about to get better?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the leader is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and oust him this year.

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

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "judged at the poll", insisting nobody would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to change leader.

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

The Spring Test

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to contend, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may not want to acknowledge 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 resign, even if a his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the public was understandably impatient for things to change. He tried to persuade me, and the nation, that this year would be different.

The economy would strengthen notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the government enacted during their first choppy year began to take effect.

• He pledged to close asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not put a new date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big point is that in 2026 the country will "turn the corner".

Political Challenges

The PM may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a some time – less tense, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from various quarters for a more decisive approach, with much more political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in this much political peril, should he consider a different script?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, gets everything its as planned.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an outcry when comments he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "procedures" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting clear political risks as the year gets going. 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 a long period, the thought he would be comfortable with these events seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but we "just do not have the entire story at the moment".

Critics demanded condemn it prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face more pressure to give an clear view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also consistently been growing tension in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's doing that, but his new specific pledge to move closer with the single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will probably elicit protests that he is reneging on his vow never to try to overturn the results that stemmed from Brexit.

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