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"I'll remain in the same position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, adding that if our interview went well, he might welcome us into Number 10 for another talk in 2026.

For a PM, there's never any break for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out exactly what had happened in Venezuela, where his big friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than usual, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the new year begins, Sir Keir appears to have had something of a revitalisation. Maybe even just a bit of a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have left him in improved morale than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they believe his political fate are poised to improve?

Leadership Questions

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that numerous of his colleagues are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and get him out this year.

However Starmer was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he stated he'd be "assessed at the poll", arguing nobody would remove his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 might be for Labour to replace its leader.

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

The Spring Test

The challenge for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to argue, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

True – up to a point. But even though he may not want 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 resign, even if a his colleagues ran against him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the electorate was understandably anxious for things to get better. He sought to convince the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economy would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the administration put in place during their first choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His big argument is that this year 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 – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing calls from within his own party for a bolder approach, with greater political clarity, more urgency, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

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

No government, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its own way.

Sir Keir's challenges are not just because governing is hard, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, including in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when statements he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir blamed "the process" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting evident political dangers as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

International Law and Brexit

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

Opponents called for him to denounce it before the interview. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also always been simmering pressure in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new more concrete pledge to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European market – will likely provoke howls that he is reneging on his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that stemmed from Brexit.

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