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"I'll be positioned in this position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, joking that if our discussion proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up conversation in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never truly break for prime ministers. In the hour before our chat started, the PM had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our lengthy talk, which was far more extended than usual, had ended, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had a degree of a reboot. Maybe even just some relaxation with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have put him in better spirits than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

But are he and his allies kidding themselves if they think his political fate are about to turn around?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that many of his colleagues think he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would sooner gamble and remove him this year.

But Sir Keir was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the poll", arguing no one would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the best chance of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to replace its leader.

"We are in the struggle of our lifetime and I intend to lead us," he declared.

The May Elections

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be assessed long before then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would step down, even if a his MPs ran against him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the voters was understandably anxious for things to change. He aimed to assure the interviewer, and the nation, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economic situation would recover despite rising unemployment, he said, when policies the administration put in place during their initial rocky year began to show results.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't set a specific 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 disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His core argument is that soon the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering calls from within his own party for a bolder strategy, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were well-known ones.

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

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

Sir Keir's challenges are not only because governing is hard, but because he and his team have erred, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM expressed regret 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 after an backlash when past remarks he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

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

And he is facing evident political risks as the year unfolds. His close relationship with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but we "simply lack the entire story at the moment".

Opponents called for him to condemn it before we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has always been simmering desire in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's pursuing that, but his new firmer commitment to move closer with the single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will probably trigger accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to undo the results that flowed from Brexit.

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