🔗 Share this article

"I'll be sitting in this position by 2027," Starmer declared, noting that if our conversation went well, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for another conversation next year.

For a PM, there's never truly time off for those in the top job. Shortly before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was much longer than usual, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

With the new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had a degree of a reboot. Maybe even just some a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

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

Yet, are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they think his standing are poised to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The harsh truth for the PM is that a significant number of his fellow MPs are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would rather gamble and oust him this year.

But Sir Keir was having none of it in the interview on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "assessed at the general election", insisting nobody would remove his electoral mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to replace leader.

"This is the fight of our times and I aim to be at the forefront," he said.

The Spring Test

The issue for the PM is that he will be judged long before then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, even if one of his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was naturally eager for things to change. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the nation, that this year would be different.

The economic situation would improve despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the government enacted during their initial turbulent year began to show results.

• He vowed to close asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't put a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it wasn't a done deal, that a settlement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now considering how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

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

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – calmer, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering demands from many directions for a bolder strategy, with much more political clarity, more vigour, more speed and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

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

No government, and especially not one that has been struggling in the polls 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 team have erred, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he regretted saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when comments he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Starmer blamed "procedures" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing obvious political dangers as the year progresses. His close relationship with the US president entails a new risk after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be content with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but the public "just do not have the full picture at the moment".

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

There has also consistently been bubbling desire in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer pledge to align more closely with the EU's single market – the vast economic European market – will likely trigger accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

A move to align with more of the single market will satisfy some on his own side, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to