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"I'll be sitting in this seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, adding that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for another chat in 2026.

For a PM, there's rarely ever break for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher precisely had transpired in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our lengthy talk, which was much longer than usual, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the year starts, Sir Keir appears to have had something of a refresh. Maybe even just a bit of a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This appeared to have left him in a more positive mood than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a terrible political year for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they believe his standing are poised to improve?

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the leader is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's ineffective at his job. A faction of them would rather take a risk and oust him this year.

However Starmer was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "assessed at the poll", arguing nobody would take his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to replace its leader.

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

The May Elections

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be judged long before then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to argue, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But although he may not want to concede it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would resign, should one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections prove disastrous for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to account for his unpopularity by saying the electorate was reasonably impatient for things to change. He aimed to convince the interviewer, and the nation, that 2026 would be different.

The economy would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when policies the government enacted during their initial choppy year began to show results.

• He vowed to close asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed 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 core message is that soon the country will "reach a turning point".

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing calls from many directions for a more decisive approach, with greater political clarity, more vigour, more pace and more urgency, his explanations were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political peril, should he consider a new narrative?

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not just because government is challenging, but because he and his team have faltered, even in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

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

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

And he is inviting evident political risks as the year gets going. His close relationship with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "career-long champion of international law" but the public "just haven't got the complete details at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to condemn it before we spoke. And the administration is likely to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also consistently been simmering desire in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new more concrete commitment to move closer with the single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely trigger accusations that he is breaking his vow never to try to overturn the results that followed Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will satisfy a faction on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to