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"I will be sitting in the same office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer remarked, noting that if our discussion was successful, he might welcome the interviewer into Downing Street for another conversation in the coming year.

There is rarely ever downtime for leaders. Shortly before the interview began, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand precisely had transpired in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had ended, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

With the year starts, Sir Keir seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just a bit of a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly appeared to have resulted in a more positive mood than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they believe his fortunes are about to improve?

Leadership Questions

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that many of his fellow MPs are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

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

Multiple times he told me he'd be "evaluated at the general election", insisting nobody would strip his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to change its leader.

"This is the battle of our generation and I intend to be at the forefront," he affirmed.

The May Elections

The problem for the PM is that he will be scrutinised far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to argue, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

Accurate – in part. But although he may be reluctant to concede 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 step down, even if one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was naturally impatient for things to change. He aimed to persuade the interviewer, and the nation, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economic situation would improve despite rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the administration enacted during their initial rocky year began to take effect.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't put a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His core message is that in 2026 the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with increased political vision, more urgency, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were repeated ones.

Given that he is in such significant political peril, should he consider a change of tack?

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

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

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

And he is courting clear political dangers as the year progresses. His alliance with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's intervention 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 thought he would be at ease with such action seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "career-long advocate of international law" but the public "simply do not have the full picture at the moment".

Critics wanted him to denounce it prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also consistently been growing pressure in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to move closer with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European market – will probably elicit accusations that he is reneging on his promise never to try to overturn the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

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