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"I will remain in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, adding that if our discussion went well, he might welcome us into Number 10 for a follow-up talk next year.

There is never any time off for those in the top job. In the hour before the interview began, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was much longer than usual, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year commences, Starmer appears to have had a degree of a refresh. Maybe even just some a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly appeared to have put him in improved morale than at the sluggish end of 2025, a dreadful year politically for him.

But are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they reckon his fortunes are poised to get better?

Party Concerns

The grisly truth for the leader is that many of his fellow MPs are convinced he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would rather gamble and oust him this year.

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

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the poll", maintaining nobody would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 might be for Labour to change leader.

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

Upcoming Local Votes

The problem for the PM is that he will be judged long before then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to contend, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But although he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, even if a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to account for his unpopularity by saying the electorate was reasonably anxious for things to get better. He tried to persuade me, and the public, that this year would be a change.

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

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, 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 talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big argument is that this year the country will "turn the corner".

A Consistent Script

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

But despite facing calls from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with much more political direction, more dynamism, more pace and more urgency, his points were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in this much political difficulty, should he consider a change of tack?

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

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

Regrets and Risks

The PM told me that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when statements he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

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

And he is courting evident political perils as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president takes on a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the thought he would be content with these events seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "just do not have the complete details at the moment".

Opponents demanded criticise the action before the interview. And the administration is likely to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has long been bubbling desire in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's doing that, but his new firmer plan to move closer with the single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely trigger accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

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