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"I'll be sitting in the same office by 2027," Starmer declared, joking that if our discussion was successful, he might welcome us into Downing Street for another chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever time off for prime ministers. In the hour before our chat started, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was much longer than typical, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

With the year commences, the Prime Minister appears to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just a bit of downtime with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have resulted in better spirits than at the saggy end of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his political fate are about to turn around?

Party Concerns

The harsh reality for the PM is that many of his colleagues are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would rather gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

But Sir Keir was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he stated he'd be "judged at the poll", arguing nobody would take his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to change its leader.

"We are in the struggle of our lifetime and I plan to guide the party," he said.

The May Elections

The issue for the PM is that he will be scrutinised well ahead of then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to contend, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – in part. But although he may be reluctant to concede it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would step down, even if one of his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections be very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was understandably anxious for things to get better. He sought to convince me, and the public, that this year would be different.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the government implemented during their first rocky year began to show results.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

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

Political Challenges

The PM may have communicated with greater vigour than observed from him for a while – less tense, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite facing demands from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with much more political clarity, more vigour, more pace and more urgency, his points were repeated ones.

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

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

Sir Keir's challenges are not only because governing is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is facing evident political risks as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president entails a new jeopardy 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 a long period, the notion he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but we "just lack the complete details at the moment".

Critics wanted him to criticise the action before we spoke. And the government is likely to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also consistently been growing tension in the Labour party to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's doing that, but his new firmer plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the huge economic European market – will probably provoke protests that he is reneging on his promise never to try to overturn the results that followed Brexit.

A move to cosy up to more of the single market will delight many on his side of the party, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to