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"I will be positioned in this office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, joking that if our interview went well, he might welcome us into Downing Street for another talk in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to work out what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

With the new year begins, Sir Keir appears to have had a kind of a reboot. Maybe even just some relaxation with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly appeared to have put him in better spirits than at the sluggish tail end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they reckon his fortunes are about to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The grisly truth for the prime minister is that many of his colleagues think he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and oust him in 2026.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the next election", arguing nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to change leader.

"This is the struggle of our lifetime and I intend to lead us," he declared.

The Spring Test

The problem for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to contend, perhaps too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – in part. But although he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would resign, even if a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to explain his low poll ratings by saying the public was naturally impatient for things to change. He sought to assure me, and the nation, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economy would strengthen notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the administration enacted during their first choppy year began to take effect.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it was not a done deal, that a peace agreement 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 talking about how to integrate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

His big message is that this year the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have communicated with more energy than I've seen from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from various quarters for a more decisive approach, with increased political clarity, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

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

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have made mistakes, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an outcry when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer attributed it to "procedures" for not realising what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is facing obvious political risks as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president entails a new risk after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "simply do not have the complete details at the moment".

Some wanted him to condemn it prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also always been bubbling pressure in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new specific plan to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the giant economic European trading zone – will probably trigger howls that he is going back on his promise never to try to reverse the choices that followed Brexit.

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