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"I will be sitting in the same position by 2027," Starmer stated, joking that if our discussion went well, he might welcome us into Number 10 for a follow-up talk in the coming year.

There is never truly time off for those in the top job. In the hour before we sat down, the PM had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his close ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was much longer than normal, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the year commences, Sir Keir appears to have had a kind of a reboot. Maybe even just some relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have left him in improved morale than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they think his political fate are about to turn around?

Leadership Questions

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that many of his party members think he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would sooner gamble and oust him in 2026.

However Sir Keir was rejecting the idea when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "judged at the general election", arguing no one would take his term from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to replace its leader.

"This is the struggle of our generation and I intend to guide the party," he said.

The Spring Test

The challenge for the PM is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to contend, maybe too much, 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 acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, should one of his MPs contested his leadership for the job, if those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

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

The economic situation would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the government enacted during their first choppy year began to show results.

• He committed to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't put a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the proviso that it wasn't a certainty, that a settlement in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western allies were now talking about how to integrate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His central point is that this year the country will "reach a turning point".

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have communicated with greater vigour than observed from him for a while – less tense, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing pressure from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with much more political direction, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his explanations were well-known ones.

Given that he is in this much political difficulty, does he need a change of tack?

No government, and especially not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its as desired.

Sir Keir's problems are not only because government is difficult, but because he and his team have faltered, including in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The PM admitted 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 backlash when comments he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir attributed it to "procedures" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is courting evident political perils as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president acquires a new risk after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over his career, the idea he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "simply lack the full picture at the moment".

Some called for him to denounce it prior to the interview. And the administration is expected to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

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

Sir Keir denies he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European trading zone – will probably trigger howls that he is breaking his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

A move to integrate into more of the single market will satisfy a faction on his backbenches, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to