🔗 Share this article

"I will remain in the same office by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, noting that if the discussion proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into Number 10 for another talk in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for those in the top job. In the hour before the interview began, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher precisely had occurred 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 our interview, which was far more extended than usual, had ended, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had something of a reboot. Maybe even just a bit of relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have left him in improved morale than at the saggy end of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they believe his political fate are set to turn around?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that numerous of his fellow MPs believe he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would rather take a risk and remove him in 2026.

However Sir Keir was having none of it when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the poll", arguing no one would take his term from him – despite the fact that the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to replace its leader.

"This is the fight of our generation and I intend to be at the forefront," he declared.

The May Elections

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

True – in part. But even though he may not want to concede 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 step down, should one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was understandably anxious for things to get better. He tried to convince me, and the nation, that this year would be different.

The economic situation would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government implemented during their first choppy year began to show results.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't set a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His central argument is that this year the country will "turn the corner".

A Consistent Script

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

However, in spite of facing demands from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with greater political clarity, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

Given that he is in considerable political trouble, does he need a different script?

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have erred, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

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

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

And he is inviting obvious political dangers as the year progresses. 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 was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the thought he would be comfortable with such action seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but the public "simply do not have the full picture at the moment".

Some called for him to criticise the action before the interview. And the government is likely to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has consistently been bubbling tension in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the outcomes of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European trading zone – will probably provoke protests that he is going back on his vow never to try to overturn the choices that flowed from Brexit.

A move to cosy up to more of the single market will delight a faction on his own side, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to