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"I will be sitting in the same seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, noting that if our conversation proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation next year.

There is never truly time off for those in the top job. In the hour before our chat started, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was far more extended than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year starts, Sir Keir seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Maybe even just a bit of downtime with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly appeared to have left him in better spirits than at the saggy end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they reckon his political fate are poised to turn around?

Leadership Questions

The grisly truth for the prime minister is that a significant number of his fellow MPs think he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would rather gamble and oust him this year.

But Sir Keir was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "assessed at the next election", maintaining nobody would strip his term from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to replace leader.

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

The May Elections

The problem for the PM is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But although he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would walk away, even if a his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He attempted to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the voters was reasonably eager for things to change. He sought to convince me, and the public, that the coming months would be distinct.

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

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now talking about how to integrate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His central argument is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – calmer, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing pressure from many directions for a bolder strategy, with much more political direction, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his explanations were well-known ones.

Given that he is in such significant political trouble, is a different approach required a different script?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, has everything its as desired.

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

Regrets and Risks

The PM expressed regret 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 statements he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the process" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is courting obvious political risks as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the thought he would be comfortable with these events seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but we "just do not have the full picture at the moment".

Some called for him to denounce it prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also long been growing tension in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the results of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's doing that, but his new specific plan to align more closely with the single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably elicit accusations that he is breaking his promise never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

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