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"I will remain in this office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, adding that if the conversation proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into Downing Street for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's never any break for those in the top job. Just an hour before our chat started, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand precisely had occurred in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year starts, Starmer seems to have had something of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just a little a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This appeared to have left him in better spirits than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

But are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they think his fortunes are about to improve?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable reality for the PM is that a significant number of his party members are convinced he's not very good at his job. A faction of them would sooner take a risk and get him out this year.

But Starmer was rejecting the idea when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he stated he'd be "judged at the general election", arguing nobody would remove his term from him – even if the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the fight of our times and I intend to lead us," he said.

The May Elections

The problem for the prime minister is that he will be assessed long before then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to argue, perhaps too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, even if one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections be very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was understandably impatient for things to change. He sought to assure me, and the nation, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economy would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the administration implemented during their first rocky year began to take effect.

• He committed to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the proviso that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western partners were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with more energy than I've seen from him for a while – calmer, perhaps, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of encountering pressure from within his own party for a bolder approach, with greater political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his points were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in this much political difficulty, should he consider a change of tack?

No government, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its own way.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister told me that he regretted 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 previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

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

And he is facing clear political perils as the year progresses. His alliance with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's military action 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 idea he would be at ease with such action seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "career-long advocate of international law" but the public "simply lack the entire story at the moment".

Opponents demanded condemn it prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has long been growing desire in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's pursuing that, but his new firmer plan to move closer with the single market – the huge economic European market – will probably elicit protests that he is going back on his promise never to try to undo the results that stemmed from Brexit.

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