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"I'll remain in the same office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer remarked, joking that if the conversation went well, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for another chat in the coming year.

There is rarely ever break for prime ministers. In the hour before our chat started, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the new year begins, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Maybe even just a little relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed 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 kidding themselves if they reckon his standing are poised to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The harsh truth for the leader is that numerous of his colleagues think he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and remove him in 2026.

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

Multiple times he stated he'd be "evaluated at the next election", arguing nobody would take his term from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the battle of our times and I aim to lead us," he said.

The May Elections

The problem for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to argue, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But although he may be reluctant to admit 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 ran against him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was reasonably anxious for things to change. He tried to convince me, and the nation, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the administration implemented during their initial choppy year began to take effect.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not put a new date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a certainty, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western allies were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His big message is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering pressure from within his own party for a bolder approach, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his arguments were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political peril, does he need a new narrative?

No government, and especially not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, has everything its as planned.

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have erred, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister told me that he regretted saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when statements he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the process" for not realising what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

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

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over his career, the thought he would be content with these events seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but the public "simply haven't got the complete details at the moment".

Critics demanded denounce it prior to the interview. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has long been growing desire in the Labour party to revisit some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's doing that, but his new more concrete pledge to align more closely with the EU's single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely trigger howls that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to undo the decisions that followed Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will please a faction on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to