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"I'll be positioned in the same office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, joking that if the discussion was successful, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up chat in 2026.

There is never truly time off for prime ministers. Just an hour before our chat started, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was much longer than typical, had ended, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the year commences, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just some relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have put him in better spirits than at the difficult end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his allies kidding themselves if they reckon his fortunes are poised to get better?

Party Concerns

The grisly reality for the leader is that a significant number of his colleagues think he's underperforming at his job. A faction of them would rather gamble and get him out in 2026.

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

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the general election", maintaining no one would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to switch leader.

"We are in the fight of our times and I aim to be at the forefront," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no situation under which he would resign, should a his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

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

The economy would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the administration put in place during their first turbulent year began to take effect.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't put a new date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt closer 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 provide security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His core argument is that in 2026 the country will "reach a turning point".

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – calmer, perhaps, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from within his own party for a bolder approach, with much more political clarity, more urgency, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, is a different approach required a new narrative?

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

Sir Keir's challenges are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have erred, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

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

Starmer attributed it to "procedures" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

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

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the thought he would be content with these events seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "longtime advocate of international law" but the public "simply do not have the complete details at the moment".

Critics called for him to condemn it prior to the interview. And the government 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 results of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer pledge to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely elicit accusations that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to overturn the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A decision to align with more of the single market will please many on his backbenches, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to